


In The Foxhole

by BottleRedRosie



Category: Timeless (TV 2016)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-25
Updated: 2017-03-28
Packaged: 2018-10-10 14:12:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 20,842
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10439439
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BottleRedRosie/pseuds/BottleRedRosie
Summary: Wyatt gets more than he bargained for when he's sent undercover in order to figure out what Garcia Flynn could be doing in a high security, segregated prison in Alabama, 1963.  Is working with Flynn really the only way he's getting out with his virtue intact?  Oneshot.  Some mature content, but nothing graphic.  Minor language.  Wyatt abuse abounds.(Now with added tag scene!)





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Rating: T  
> Words: 19,000  
> Spoilers: Set somewhere around episode 1.11ish.  
> Warnings: Language, non-graphic adult situations, threats of m/m non-con.  
> Summary: Wyatt gets more than he bargained for when he's sent undercover in order to figure out what Garcia Flynn could be doing in a high security, segregated prison in Alabama, 1963. Is working with Flynn really the only way he's getting out with his virtue intact?  
> Disclaimer: Everything is owned by someone else.  
> A/N: There comes a time in every fanfic writer's life when they produce the obligatory prison fic. This is mine with a Timeless twist. I've really enjoyed Wyatt's scenes with Flynn in season 1, even though there aren't that many of them, so I thought I'd write them a little bit more interaction. I seem to have a thing for Wyatt abuse. A little bit AU regarding Wyatt's knowledge of the Cahill family.

** IN THE FOXHOLE **

“You know what they _do_ to guys like you in places like that?” Rufus asked, struggling to keep up with Wyatt as he made his way toward Mason Industries’ extensive wardrobe area.

Wyatt stopped suddenly, and Rufus had to double back to his position.

“Whaddya mean, ‘guys like me’?” Wyatt asked.

Rufus shrugged.  “You’ve seen _Oz_ , right?” he said, as if that should explain everything.

Wyatt frowned at him.

“You know.  Lots of guys locked up together?” Rufus continued.  “Limited options for—you know—entertainment.”

Wyatt looked at him blankly before shaking his head and resuming his march.  He wasn’t particularly happy with this assignment, and Rufus pointing out one of the things he _really_ wasn’t particularly happy with was not helping.

“I’m just saying,” Rufus continued, trotting along beside him.  “You need to be careful.  I think you’ll be—” He stopped as if considering the correct word.  “Popular.”

“Rufus.”  Wyatt was pretty sure the warning was clear in his tone, but Rufus just carried right on rambling.

“Because I don’t know if you’ve looked in a mirror lately, but you’re not exactly hideous.  Pretty guys and prison?  Not a good match.”

“Will you stop calling me that?” Wyatt grit out, turning and marching away from his friend again.

Rufus sprinted to catch up with him.  “What, pretty?  Dude, you are gonna be _so_ damn popular, like a regular Homecoming Queen—”

Wyatt stopped again, and Rufus once again overshot his position.

“That’s it, I’m figuring out how to pilot the stupid time machine myself.”

Rufus didn’t appear particularly wounded by Wyatt’s threat.  “You’re kidding, right?” he sniggered.  “You’d be safer locked up with a hundred horny prison inmates with a thing for blue-eyed pretty boys.”

“I have a gun, you know,” Wyatt said shortly.

Rufus didn’t seem to respond to the threat.  “You know I’ve got your back though, right?” he said instead.

“How exactly do you have my back?” Wyatt asked.  “It’s an all-white, all-male prison in Alabama in 1963.  Not exactly somewhere you and Lucy can go undercover.”

“In spirit, man,” Rufus clarified.  “I got your back _in spirit_.”

“Well that makes me feel so much better,” Wyatt said, reaching around the pilot to get at a dark blue suit on the rack behind him.  “I’ll remember that when someone tries to shank me in the shower.”

Rufus tilted his head.  “Dude, I don’t think it’s gonna be shanks you gotta worry about them trying to stick in you in the shower.”

Wyatt just looked at him.  “Did you _really_ just say that?” he asked incredulously.  “Please tell me you didn’t just say that.”

Rufus shrugged.  “Just sayin’.”

“Well...” Wyatt began, “...don’t,” he finished lamely.  He shook his head.  “I think maybe you’ve seen one too many prison movies.”

“While you haven’t seen enough, apparently.”

“Rufus,” Wyatt said, shrugging into a white button down shirt.  “I can take care of myself.  Delta Force.  Remember?”

“You know how many times you’ve been knocked out, tied up and handcuffed since we met?”

“Too many.”

“My point exactly.”

Wyatt sighed as he finished dressing hurriedly.  “If it makes you feel any better, it’s not my first time in prison.”

Rufus blinked at him.  “It’s not what now?” he said.  “‘Cause it sounded like you just said you’d been in prison, Mr. Goody Two Shoes Yes Ma’am No Ma’am Will That Be All Ma’am.”

Wyatt actually snorted at that.  “I got thrown in the stockade once,” he admitted.

Rufus’s eyes widened.  “No way!” he burst out.  “What for, jaywalking?”

Wyatt shrugged.  “Kinda disrespected a superior officer.”

Rufus blinked again.  “Seriously?  Disrespected how?”

Wyatt shrugged again sheepishly.  “Kinda punched him in the face how.”

Rufus’s mouth fell open for a second.  “No.  Freakin’.  Way.”

“Yep.”

“Why would you do that?”

“He was a jackass.”

“And…?”

“And he had hardly any combat experience.”

“And…?”

“And he wanted to send my unit into a minefield after an insurgent.”

“And you didn’t think that would be such a good idea?”

Wyatt blinked at him.  “Not really, no.  Seeing as how after I decked him the insurgent kinda got himself blown to smithereens.”

“Ah.  And they locked you up for that?”

“For a month.”

“Not exactly the same as a high security prison in Alabama in 1963 though.”

“No,” Wyatt agreed.  “Not exactly.”

“So how’re you planning on getting in there?”

“Same way Flynn got in,” Wyatt explained with a grin.  “I’m gonna break the law.”

*

It turned out breaking the law was the easy part.

Getting sent to Greenside Penitentiary?

Not so much.

They just didn’t seem to want to lock a nice white boy like Wyatt up.

So he took a leaf out of his own book and decked the arresting officer.

That seemed to do the trick.

Next thing he knew, Wyatt was on a bus to prison, his wrists and ankles shackled and a guy the size of King Kong eyeing him up from across the aisle.

And that was _before_ he even made it inside the prison.

Once in there, he wasn’t entirely sure of his next move.

Lucy had absolutely no idea what Flynn could be doing here, and even Jiya’s Google-fu seemed to have let them down research-wise.  There was just no one here of any significance to history whatsoever.  The only reason they even knew Flynn had infiltrated the prison was thanks to Connor Mason’s facial recognition software and a photo some journalist happened to have snapped while he was there.

Wyatt either had to find someone who knew the tall, dark haired guy with the Eastern European accent and had some idea what the hell he was doing here, or he had to find the tall, dark haired guy with the Eastern European accent and ask him himself.

Neither option seemed particularly attractive, but the sooner he figured out what was going on, the sooner he could get the hell out of here.

Agent Christopher had suggested Lucy going undercover as a prison nurse as back-up, but Wyatt wouldn’t hear of it, and there was no way Rufus was getting within five miles of this place.  The Governor, by all accounts, was a paid up Imperial Wizard in the KKK and Wyatt wasn’t risking Rufus going anywhere near that mess.

So here he was.  No back-up.  No idea what Flynn was up to.  And some guy looking at him like he wanted to do very bad things to him that Wyatt was pretty sure he wouldn’t find particularly pleasant.

The phrase, _Why do I always get the big guys?_ crossed his mind again for the first time since the night Abraham Lincoln died.

*

All things considered, it could be worse, Wyatt told himself.

Until he was shown to his cell and his roomie turned out to be the gorilla from off of the bus.

“Hey,” Wyatt said nervously.  “I’m Wyatt.”

King Kong looked him up and down—and then looked him up and down some more—before announcing, “Romeo.”

Wyatt swallowed.  “That’s...an interesting name,” he said, his voice sounding a little bit too high, even to his own ears.

The behemoth took a step toward him, causing him to take a step back and into the wall.

“You wanna be my Juliet?”

Wyatt took a breath.  “Uh—” he began.  “That’s...funny,” he said, trying to fake a smile but failing horribly.  “I guess.”  Then, “Did that line ever actually work for you?”

Romeo took another step toward him which had Wyatt glancing in the direction of the cell door.

The closed and locked cell door.

Wyatt could honestly say he’d never seen a square guy before. 

He estimated Romeo at about 6’5” tall and 6’5” wide and while that might have been funny if this were an episode of _Spongebob_ _Squarepants_ , over here on _Prison_ _Break_?  Really not a lot of laughs from Wyatt’s seven inches shorter and a helluva lot narrower perspective.

So when the guy leaned his hand against the wall next to Wyatt’s head and got his mouth as close to Wyatt’s neck as he could get it without actually having to buy him dinner first, Wyatt was more than a little relieved by the loudspeaker suddenly springing into life and a disembodied voice announcing, “Association,” just as the door sprang open allowing Wyatt to duck under Romeo’s arm and out into the hallway while he still had his virtue intact.

Taking a breath, he quickly got in line with the other prisoners off his block, several of whom swiveled their heads in his direction with a little bit more interest than was strictly comfortable.  He hoped to hell Romeo didn’t end up in line behind him.

He didn’t, but the guy who did wasn’t any less intimidating.

“Hey, doll,” he said, eyeing Wyatt up and down in much the same way Romeo had.  “You new here?”

At least this guy was only about four inches taller than Wyatt, and he was pretty sure he could take him if he tried anything.

“Uh,” he replied awkwardly.  “Yeah.  First day.”

The guy smiled a big, dentally-challenged smile at him, and Wyatt was torn between turning back in the direction they were supposed to be walking and not wanting to turn his back on the guy at all.

In the end, one of the guards made the decision for him, ramming his nightstick into Wyatt’s jaw and shoving him around until he was facing the right direction.

“That way, son,” the guard said, indicating the thin sliver of daylight emanating from somewhere at the end of the depressingly dingy hallway.

“Thank you, sir,” Wyatt said, the “sir” coming out automatically.

“You being sarcastic, son?” the guard asked, taking a step toward him.

Wyatt swallowed.  “Uh,” he stammered.  “Sir, no, sir.”  He winced as that word came out again.  “Ex-military, sir,” he added.  “Can’t help myself, sir.”

The guard squinted at him as if trying to decide whether he was being sarcastic or not.  Then he grabbed Wyatt’s jaw in his hand and squeezed. 

“You better not be disrespecting me, son,” he said.  “We got punishments for that sort of thing around here.”

Wyatt blinked at him.  “I’m sure you do, sir.”

The guard’s squint narrowed.  “You’re new around here, right?”

“Sir, yes sir,” Wyatt confirmed, wincing again.  _Cease and desist with the ‘sirs’ right now, Sergeant!_ he chided himself.

“Then I’ll cut you a break this time.  But don’t think about disrespecting me again.  You’ll live to regret it, son.”

Wyatt nodded, biting back the “Sir, yes sir,” that desperately wanted to make its way out of his mouth.

The guard released his grip on Wyatt’s jaw as the line started to move forward, and the guy behind leaned over his shoulder and mumbled, “Watch out for O’Donovan, kid.  He likes his boys obedient, if you know what I mean.”

Wyatt _didn’t_ , in fact, know what the guy behind him meant, he only knew he in no way wanted to find out.

So his initial assessment that things could be worse?  Yeah, completely reassessing that one in light of recent events.

He blinked into daylight as he followed the line of inmates out into the prison yard, weak yellow sun leaking down into a small courtyard with a basketball hoop, a set of bleachers and what might have been exercise equipment in another life, surrounded by a twelve foot chain link fence topped with barbed wire and overlooked by a tower being patrolled by a prison officer with a mean-looking rifle propped against his shoulder.

He half expected Paul Newman to be sitting on the bleachers, but instead there was just a mousy-looking redhead with a copy of Sun Tzu’s _The Art of War_ propped against his knees huddled there.

Considering his options, the redhead seemed the least threatening guy on the courtyard, so Wyatt figured asking him if he’d seen a tall, dark haired guy with an Eastern European accent around these parts couldn’t hurt.

Unfortunately, he never even got to sit down before someone was grabbing his arm and almost pulling him off his feet.

The guy with the missing teeth sniggered as he stood behind the heavily self-tattooed asshole who currently had a grip on Wyatt’s biceps.

“Hey!” Wyatt protested, trying and failing spectacularly to shrug the guy off.  “Get your hands off me, man.”

Tattoos grinned at him.

“You’re right, Vince,” he threw over his shoulder to Toothless.  “Unclaimed and unchained.  This is gonna be fun.”

Wyatt wasn’t entirely sure what was going on, but he sure as hell wasn’t letting Tattoos drag him into the dark alcove behind the bleachers he and Toothless seemed to be heading him for.

But he was equally pretty sure starting a prison riot on his first day wasn’t such a great idea either.

He settled for kneeing Tattoos in the groin and twisting his arm up behind his back before spitting, “Gotta learn how to take no for an answer, man,” into his ear and shoving him into Toothless so hard the two of them landed together in a heap on the concrete at Redhead’s feet.

Unfortunately for Wyatt, where Tattoos and Toothless had been standing, there were now about ten guys heading in his general direction, and none of them looked particularly friendly.

“You might want to run, honey,” Redhead said helpfully.  “Those boys get their hands on you, you ain’t gonna be needing no exercise for the rest of the week.”

Wyatt swallowed.

Okay, this was all kinds of not good.

When Rufus told him he was going to be popular, he had no idea he meant _this_ popular.

Glancing around himself, he considered his options.

Of which there was exactly one:  Prison riot.

Whilst Wyatt was fairly sure he could take on two or three of the truck-sized guys heading his way without breaking too much of a sweat, ten or so of them was going to be pushing it a bit.

And he had entirely nowhere to run to.

He backed up slowly, holding his hands up in a show of surrender that he had absolutely no intention of honoring if any of these guys tried to put any parts of their anatomy anywhere near him anytime soon.

And then he felt the chain link fence at his back and stopped abruptly.

The posse heading in his direction did not.

“Okay, fellas,” he said slowly.  “I know I’m the new guy here, but it’s absolutely fine by me if we postpone the welcome wagon for, oh, I don’t know, a couple of months until I at least get to know you all by name—”

Tattoos had managed to struggle to his feet by this time and appeared to be at the head of the line, and he and his bruised—uh—ego didn’t seem at all too pleased with Wyatt’s performance so far.

“You need teaching a lesson, boy,” he told him, and Wyatt really wasn’t sure he was down for any kind of lesson taught by this asshole in the near future.

“I hope it’s not math,” he said, glancing around him as he reconsidered his very much dwindling options.  “I always sucked at math.”

Tattoos grinned at him.  “You’re gonna be sucking at somethin’ else by the time I’m done with you, sweetheart.”

And Wyatt almost laughed at that.  “That’s nearly kinda funny,” he said, clutching at the fence behind him and wondering how fast he could scale twelve feet and how far he’d get before the guy in the guard tower turned him into a sieve.

Not freakin’ far enough, that was for sure.

Tattoos was about a foot away from him when he was suddenly shoved to one side by another guy who decided grabbing hold of Wyatt’s face and sticking his tongue down his throat was entirely the way to go.

Once again, Wyatt had absolutely no idea what was going on, but when it came to fight or flight, he had the fight part down perfectly.

Unfortunately, so did the guy who currently had the lip lock on him.

The punch he threw at the guy’s head was blocked easily, as was the knee he tried to ram into his groin, Wyatt’s wrist slammed back against the fence and an arm wrapped around his waist so he was too close to do any more kicking or kneeing, and all of this while the guy continued trying to smooch him senseless.

Didn’t stop Wyatt stomping on his foot though.

Which elicited a strangled yell and caused his assailant to withdraw his offending tongue immediately.

And that’s when things got _really_ weird.

Because the last thing Wyatt expected to happen next was Garcia Flynn biting his neck hard enough to draw blood.

Wyatt yelped.  “What the hell, man?” he demanded, trying to shove Flynn off him with his one free hand, which only caused Flynn to grab that wrist and slam it into the fence above his head, like the other one.

Wyatt stood there for a second glaring at him, completely pinned in place and able to achieve absolutely zero.

“Calm down, sweetie,” Flynn said, a forced grin on his face.  “You want these nice gentlemen to see don’t you?”

Wyatt stopped struggling for a second.  “See what?” he demanded, glancing beyond Flynn’s shoulder to Tattoos, Toothless, and the assembled rape gang behind them.

Flynn glanced over his shoulder at them.  “This one’s _mine_ ,” he called out assertively.  “Marked and claimed.”  He indicated the bite mark he’d left on Wyatt’s neck that would probably last a little bit longer than your average hickey.  “No one touches him but me, understand?”

Wyatt wasn’t entirely sure how he felt about being claimed as Flynn’s property, but when the assembled band of would-be rapists grudgingly began to turn away with only a dissatisfied grumble, he had to admit, there were worse ways this whole thing could have gone down.

Flynn continued to pin him to the fence for several seconds after the tide of lustful prisoners had receded, prompting Wyatt to demand, “Will you please get your hands off me now?” to which Flynn responded, albeit slowly.

Of course as soon as his wrists were released, Wyatt took the opportunity to punch Flynn in the face.  Which at least made him feel slightly less emasculated.

“That’s for kissing me without permission,” he told him, wiping his mouth on the back of his hand.

Flynn straightened, rubbing at his jaw as he did so.

A tiny trickle of blood ran down his chin from the corner of his mouth, and he wiped it away in much the same way Wyatt had wiped away the taste of Flynn from his mouth.

“Remind me to ask you first next time,” Flynn commented dryly.

Wyatt scowled at him.  “Oh, there won’t be a next time, pal.”

Flynn caught hold of the front of Wyatt’s regulation dark blue work shirt and yanked him a step closer.  “I saved your ass, remember?” he said.  “Literally.”

Wyatt disengaged Flynn’s fingers abruptly.  “Touch me again and I swear to God—”

“Listen to me, Wyatt,” Flynn snapped, pushing him back up against the fence.  “I’m doing you a favor here.  Just go with it.  Pretend I’m your man, or take your chances with these assholes.”  He indicated Wyatt’s admirers with a thumb jerked over his shoulder.  The offending prisoners had retreated to a safe distance, but not far enough to not be able to see what Wyatt and Flynn were doing.

Wyatt swallowed.  “What are we doing here, man?” he asked at length, the exasperation clear in his voice.

“You’re chasing me, like you always do,” Flynn said.  “Like I was counting on you to do.”

Wyatt frowned at him.  “You were _counting_ on me...?”

Flynn inclined his head so that his mouth was right against Wyatt’s ear.  “That’s right, sweetheart,” he said.  “Stop struggling.  I need your help.”

*

Turned out the dark alcove behind the bleachers where Tattoos and Toothless had been attempting to drag Wyatt in order to get to know him a little better was a storage area of sorts which appeared to be very popular with prisoners wanting a little bit more than “association” during Association time.

Wyatt only twice threatened to break Flynn’s fingers if he touched him again before allowing himself to be manhandled in that direction.

“Do as I tell you and everything will be fine,” Flynn assured him, grabbing Wyatt’s upper arm and frog-marching him into the gloominess of the alcove.

“Hate to break it to you, pal,” Wyatt protested, “but you are _not_ my C.O.  You don’t _tell_ me to do anything.”

Flynn smirked.  “So you only do what Lucy tells you out of chivalry?”

Wyatt scowled at him.  “Screw you, man,” he said, yanking his arm free of Flynn’s long fingers.  He backed up a step, straight into the wall, and realized that not for the first time that day he’d been shoved into a tight space by a guy a lot bigger than he was whose intentions he wasn’t entirely clear on.  Which was totally unfair of the universe, in his opinion.  “What are we doing here?” he demanded again, and this time Flynn grinned at him lopsidedly.

“We’re having sex,” he said shortly.  “Obviously.”

Wyatt blinked at him, his mouth opening and closing a couple of times but nothing vaguely word-related coming out.

Flynn smirked at him again.  “Or so your admirers out there are thinking,” he clarified.

Wyatt swallowed and took a short breath.  “Okay, I knew that,” he lied, kind of relieved he’d not misunderstood Flynn’s intentions towards him quite so drastically.

Flynn appeared to take pity on him.  “Until a new prisoner is marked,” he explained, causing Wyatt to flinch slightly when he reached out to touch the bite mark he’d left on his neck, “you’re kind of an all-you-can-eat buffet.  The good time that can be had by all.  Once you’re claimed, the other prisoners kind of have an honor among thieves thing going on where they keep their hands off each other’s property.”

Wyatt straightened.  “Just so we’re clear,” he said, “this is a total marriage of convenience and I am not in any way your property.”

Flynn nodded indulgently.  “Agreed, Master Sergeant,” he said.  “You belong to Miss Preston and Miss Preston only.”

Wyatt scowled at him again.  “You’re an asshole,” he told him.

Flynn inclined his head slightly.  “Good to know,” he said.  “And I apologize for having touched such an obvious nerve.”

“Look,” Wyatt said on a frustrated sigh.  “In case it’s slipped your mind, my actual job is to arrest you or put a bullet in your head.  My superiors don’t really care which.  I’m not actually here to help you.  So what the hell is going on?”

“You mean we’re not really here to have sex?”

“I swear to _God_ —” Wyatt was rapidly losing his patience.

“Alright, alright,” Flynn placated him.  “Keep your shirt on.  Or.  Y’know.  Not.”

Wyatt rolled his eyes.  “Okay, that’s it, I’m outta here—”

But before he could shove past the erstwhile terrorist, Flynn had once again gotten hold of him and slammed him back against the wall, his forearm wedged across Wyatt’s throat.

“Stop.  Struggling,” Flynn instructed him yet again, and it took every ounce of Wyatt’s self-control not to just knee the bastard in the groin, smack him in the face and drag him back to the Lifeboat by his shirt collar.

All of which may have been somewhat difficult for Wyatt to achieve in his current position.

“Then tell me _what_ _the_ _hell_ _is_ _going_ _on_?!” Wyatt demanded.  “And for the hundredth time, _get_ _your_ _freakin’_ _hands_ _off_ _me_!”

Flynn released his hold on him and held his hands aloft in truce.  “Alright,” he said, placatingly.  “Story time.”

“Finally.”

“You ever hear of a guy called Ethan Cahill?”

Flynn paused, as if waiting for Wyatt to react to the name.

Wyatt shrugged.  “Not that I know of,” he replied, and Wyatt could swear Flynn looked relieved.

“Good,” he said cryptically, causing Wyatt to make a mental note to find out what the hell that meant and why Flynn thought he might have a clue who this Ethan Cahill guy might be.  “Ethan Cahill,” Flynn continued, “is currently a White House aide working with the US Department of Agriculture on a program of modernizing and upgrading farming machinery in order to speed up production and reduce costs.”

Wyatt shrugged again.  “And...?”

“He’s Rittenhouse.”

 _Ah_.  _Now_ _we’re_ _getting_ _somewhere_.

“And...?”

“In 1961, a gentleman by the name of Robert Reed was found guilty of attempting to murder Ethan Cahill, his wife, and their young son by setting fire to their house while they were inside it,” Flynn continued.  “Reed had previously worked in an agricultural machinery plant in Mobile which was closed due to Cahill’s modernization project.”

“Okay,” Wyatt said.  “And then what?”

“Subsequent to the plant’s closing,” Flynn continued, “Reed was unable to obtain work.  He lost first his home, then his wife and his family.”

“And that’s when he decided to punish the guy he held responsible?” Wyatt guessed,  “By destroying _his_ home and family?”

“Precisely,” Flynn agreed. 

“Okay, so what does this tale of woe have to do with why I’m stuck in a storage closet with the guy I’m supposed to be trying to kill, while everyone outside thinks we’re screwing like bunnies?”

Flynn took a breath.  “That red-headed fellow who tried to warn you about the welcome party?”

Wyatt cast his mind back to the mousy guy sitting on the bleachers.  “Robert Reed?” he hazarded.

“The very same,” Flynn confirmed.

“And what do you want with him?” Wyatt asked.

Flynn paused for a second.  “I want to help him escape.”

Wyatt considered that.  “You want to…?”

“In the original timeline, Reed was shot dead trying to escape from Greenside Penitentiary on May 5th, 1963.”

Wyatt squinted, trying to remember what date he’d come back to.  Keeping track of little details like that was Lucy and Rufus’ job.  He just kept them all alive while they did it.

“That’s tomorrow,” Flynn informed him helpfully.  “Or, more importantly, the early hours of tomorrow morning.  Reed tries to escape tonight.”

“That doesn’t give you a whole lot of time to help him,” Wyatt pointed out.  Then, “And why do you _want_ to help him?”

Flynn took a breath.

Wyatt figured he was pretty good at reading people most of the time.  But right now?  He got the distinct impression Flynn was hiding something from him.

“Since he was imprisoned two years ago,” Flynn continued to explain, “Reed has sent Cahill over three hundred threatening letters.  He’s even sent some to his wife.”

“Obsessive much?” Wyatt observed.

“Just a little bit,” Flynn agreed. 

Wyatt thought about that for a second.  “You want to help Reed escape so he’ll take another crack at Cahill and his family?”

Flynn swallowed.  “Cahill’s son, Wyatt,” he said, shaking his head.  “In our time, he is one of the guiding forces behind everything Rittenhouse does.  He’s a monster.  He’s the man who ordered my family’s death; the man who threatened Rufus’ family.”

Wyatt didn’t say anything immediately.  He wasn’t used to trying to save history on his own.  He, Lucy and Rufus usually made moral choices like this together; although he already knew for sure what Lucy would have to say about this.

“We don’t kill children,” he said shortly.  Because that’s what Lucy would say.  That’s what Lucy _had_ said.

And Wyatt had said the same himself many times when he’d been deployed overseas.

Flynn nodded.  “ _Lucy_ doesn’t kill children,” he pointed out.

Wyatt straightened.  “I happen to agree with her.”

“What if I told you Ethan Cahill’s son would go on to harm Lucy?”

Wyatt froze.

Swallowed.

Tried to breathe and suddenly couldn’t.

“How?” he finally managed to ask.

“It’s complicated,” Flynn didn’t explain.

“Well _un_ complicate it,” Wyatt insisted, taking the opportunity to shove Flynn back against the wall for a change.

Flynn licked his lips and took a breath.  “Something he does in the future directly affects her,” he said. 

“Opaque much?” Wyatt pointed out.  “You want me to help you kill a kid I want to know why, chapter and verse.”

“For Lucy.”

“That’s not enough.”

“Are you sure about that?”

Wyatt swallowed again.

“I can’t tell you any more than I already have, Wyatt,” Flynn said.  “I just want you to know that if Ethan Cahill’s son dies it will deal a crushing blow to Rittenhouse and save Lucy a lot of heartache.”

Wyatt considered that.  “Why should I believe you?”

“You probably shouldn’t,” Flynn admitted.  “Considering our respective circumstances.”  He pushed Wyatt off him and moved a step closer, and Wyatt would have taken a step back to preserve his personal space had he been able.   “But you know what I have at stake here.  If I can destroy Rittenhouse here, in 1963, by killing Cahill’s son, then my wife and daughter will be spared.  Along with Lucy’s sister, perhaps.  And maybe even your wife.”

Wyatt blinked at him.  “Rittenhouse weren’t responsible for Jessica’s death,” he said, before pausing for a second.  “Were they?  Flynn?”

Flynn shrugged.  “I honestly don’t know for sure,” he said.  And Wyatt was pretty sure he believed him.  “But we can’t know what the Rittenhouse that exists in our future has done to our present or our past.  If we fail to stop them, if they go on to wreak havoc on time with the Mothership or the Lifeboat, then they will most certainly have known about the part you played in resisting them.  Maybe Jessica’s death played a role in that somehow.  It certainly ensured you would one day take the government up on their offer to travel through time and hunt me down.  Maybe Rittenhouse always needed you to do that.”

Wyatt shook his head.  “I’ll never get used to people talking about my present as if it’s the past,” he said.  He needed to think about this.  Because the idea that Rittenhouse had maybe been involved in Jessica’s death?  Well that was pretty huge.  “Why do you need _my_ help, specifically?” he asked at length.

Flynn smiled a little hollowly.  “I need a distraction.”

Wyatt squinted at him.  “You want me to be a distraction?  Couldn’t one of your guys have come here and done that for you?”

Flynn shook his head.  “I need a very _specific_ distraction.  With a very specific skill set.”

Wyatt wasn’t sure he liked the sound of this.  “Go on,” he said slowly.

“There’s a prison officer here by the name of O’Donovan,” Flynn began to explain.  “I would be very surprised if you hadn’t met him yet.”

Wyatt nodded.  “I’d been here five minutes and I already got introduced to his nightstick.”

“He has…” Flynn paused for a second while he appeared to choose his words very carefully.  “He has an… alternative income source.  A business of sorts.  One that he runs with the help of a select few of the inmates here.”

Wyatt _really_ didn’t like the sound of this.  “Toothless out there said something about him liking his boys obedient?”  He shrugged.  “I wasn’t entirely sure what he was talking about.”

“O’Donovan… provides a service,” Flynn began to explain.  “To certain…ah…gentlemen in the area.  Wealthy gentlemen who pay for the privilege.”

Wyatt narrowed his eyes.  “What privilege?”

“Did you know same-sex relationships were only made legal in Alabama in 2003?” Flynn asked him completely out of leftfield.

Wyatt paused.  “Uh,” he stuttered.  “Can’t say that I did?”

“In 1963, men could go to prison for having sex with other men.”

Wyatt _really_ didn’t like where this conversation was going.  “And?” he asked tightly.

“Like I said,” Flynn continued.  “O’Donovan provided a service.  Filled a gap in the market.”

“What kind of ‘gap’?” Wyatt asked suspiciously.

“Somehow, so the story goes, he found a way to get certain select clients into and out of the prison so that they could—uh—partake of the young men O’Donovan pressed into his service without alerting his superiors.”

“‘Partake’?” Wyatt echoed.  “You better not be telling me what I think you’re telling me.”

Flynn shrugged.  “By all accounts, O’Donovan paid his ‘boys’ well for their services.  He took care of them, protected them.  None of the other inmates dared mess with them...”

“No,” Wyatt said flatly, making another attempt at getting past Flynn.  “Whatever you’re planning on asking me to do, the answer’s no.”

Flynn once again blocked Wyatt’s exit, a hand on his chest pushing him back against the wall.

“Just hear me out first—”

“If you’re asking me to go pretend to be a prostitute for you—”

“You wouldn’t actually have to _do_ anything—”

“—Then guess what?  The answer is _no_.  Got that?”

“Just listen, okay?”

Wyatt scowled at him, but stilled for a second.

“In the original timeline, Reed figured out what O’Donovan was up to when his cellmate kept disappearing odd evenings and coming back...marked.”

“Marked?”

Flynn shrugged.  “The particular client who had a thing for Reed’s cellmate apparently liked the rough stuff.”

Wyatt ground his teeth for a second before muttering, “This just gets better and better...”

“Reed’s cellmate, one Isaiah Dixon, though sworn to secrecy by O’Donovan, was not, shall we say, the brightest bulb in the box.  He told Reed what had been going on, how O’Donovan had approached him and offered him extra ‘work’ on the side.  He explained how the clients were somehow brought into the prison using some kind of access tunnel that no one but O’Donovan seemed to know existed, the location of which he never revealed to his ‘boys.’  And that was when Reed came up with his escape plan.”

“Get Dixon to find out the location of the tunnel?” Wyatt hazarded.

“Exactly,” Flynn confirmed.  “The plan was that when Dixon next had a ‘date,’ he would incapacitate O’Donovan and get the client to guide him and Reed through the tunnel to freedom.”

Wyatt shrugged.  “Half-decent plan, I guess.”

Flynn nodded.  “One would think so,” he agreed.  “In competent hands.  Problem was, as I said, Dixon wasn’t too bright and Reed wasn’t much of a planner.  When it came time to put their plan into action, it all went a little bit wrong.”

“How wrong?”

“May 4th, 1963, O’Donovan took Dixon to meet the client, CEO of a local printing firm by the name of William Mackie.  Dixon decided he would take O’Donovan out then and there and force Mackie to take him and Reed, who had library detail so had free rein of the cell block, out through the tunnel.  Unfortunately, Mackie was ex-military so not exactly terrified of the nightstick Dixon stole off of O’Donovan when he tried to overpower him, and he didn’t think to check whether O’Donovan was any further armed after he hit him over the head and presumed he’d knocked him unconscious.  O’Donovan was neither unconscious nor unarmed, so when Reed came rushing into the room, Mackie overpowered Dixon while O’Donovan got out the .22 he always armed himself with when he was running his side business and shot both Dixon and Reed dead.  Mackie helped O’Donovan move the bodies into the tunnel, got the hell out of Dodge, then O’Donovan raised the alarm and claimed he shot the prisoners when he discovered them trying to escape.  The tunnel was sealed off and O’Donovan lost his side business but kept his job.  For another ten years.  When he finally hit on the wrong inmate who battered him to death.”

“So at least there’s a happy ending,” Wyatt commented.  “How do you know all this?”

“The client,” Flynn explained.  “Mackie.  Spilled his guts to a reporter some thirty-plus years later.  That report gave me an idea.”

“After you read up on Robert Reed and what he was locked up for?”

“Precisely,” Flynn confirmed.  “To get Reed’s plan to work, all I needed was someone a little bit more competent than Dixon, who would be capable of overpowering and securing O’Donovan and convincing Mackie to show him the way out.  While myself or a couple of my guys might have been able to do that, none of us fit the client’s physical specifications for his ‘date.’”

Wyatt swallowed.  “Which were...?”

“Well I figured from looking at photographs of Dixon and other men with whom Mackie had had liaisons over the years, that he had a definite ‘type,’ namely, late twenties to early thirties, good-looking, dark hair, average height, athletic build.  Pretty.  Undoubtedly liked the pretty boys.  And blue eyes.  Definitely had a thing for blue eyes.”

Wyatt swallowed again.  “And you thought...?”

“And I thought, ‘Who do I know who fits all of those physical criteria and would be competent enough to do the job I need doing?’”

“And for some reason you thought of me?  I’m flattered.”  Wyatt was not, in any way, flattered.

“I’m always thinking of you, Sergeant,” Flynn commented sardonically.

“And I’m always happy to punch you in the face again, asshat,” Wyatt returned.  “What makes you think O’Donovan, who’s seen me exactly once for two minutes, would try and recruit me to—to—service Mackie over Dixon, who Mackie already has a thing for?”

“Dixon’s not here,” Flynn said shortly.

“Huh?”

“How do you think I got in here?  Dixon was in for beating up some guy in a bar fight.”

“And you got in the middle of that instead?”

Flynn nodded.  “Knocked out Dixon and decked the guy he was arrested for assaulting.”

“Getting yourself arrested instead of Dixon?”  Wyatt had to admit, however grudgingly, that that was kind of clever.  “And at the same time saving his life?”

Flynn shrugged.  “When this is over, I’ll have to look him up.  See what he did with his extra time on the planet.”

“And what makes you think you and I have a better chance of pulling this off than Reed and Dixon?”

“Because I’m smarter than they were and you’re better at thinking on your feet.  And I’m guessing you don’t want some middle-aged rich guy into the rough stuff forcing himself on you.”

Wyatt failed to suppress a shudder.  “So, to clarify,” he said.  “You want me to get O’Donovan to recruit me into his little prostitution racket by tonight, incapacitate him, and somehow get my ‘date’ to show me this tunnel, and presumably get you and Reed out with me?”

Flynn nodded.  “That’s about the size of it.”

“So that you can get Reed to off this Cahill guy’s kid in the hope that it will save your family and keep Lucy from some as-yet-unspecified heartache?”

“Exactly.”

“And how am I supposed to do that?”

“That’s why I wanted you here, Wyatt.  You’re good in a crisis.”

“So this Mackie guy never told the reporter where the tunnel was?”

“Unfortunately not.  I guess he didn’t want to be responsible for someone else trying to escape from prison.”

“So if I help you...”

“You and I get the hell out of here.  Rittenhouse is dealt a crushing blow.  My family—and yours and Lucy’s—might be saved.  And you do Lucy a huge favor.”

“Although you’re not going to tell me what that is exactly?”

Flynn grinned.  “Trust me.”

Wyatt grimaced at him.  “Like _that’s_ gonna happen.”

“Look,” Flynn said.  “We know that Mackie is looking for a very specific date tonight.  O’Donovan doesn’t have Dixon so he needs to find someone quickly.  You’ve already caught his eye once.  You just need to do it again to ensure he comes after you.”

Wyatt actually felt kind of queasy at the idea.  “Shooting stuff for a living is a helluva lot more straightforward than all this undercover bullshit,” he commented.

“From what I’ve seen of you, son,” Flynn said, “you’re pretty good at this ‘undercover bullshit.’  If anyone can help me do this, it’s you.”

“And while I’m trying to get O’Donovan to sell me to some rich guy for sex, you’re going to be doing what exactly?”

“I have to persuade Reed that he wants to be in on my plan.  Without him, I can’t get out of my cell when I need to be out of my cell.”

Wyatt thought about it for a long second, all the while acutely aware of Flynn’s intense gaze boring into him.  “Why was O’Donovan there when Dixon was about to get it on with Mackie?” he asked carefully, one of many things that was bugging him about this whole endeavor.

Flynn shrugged.  “He liked to watch,” he said simply.

Wyatt blinked at him.  “He what now?”

“It was part of the deal.  His clients got access to his boys on condition he got to watch.”

“That’s kinda…creepy.”

“Yes.  It kinda is.”

“So I have to get Mackie compliant at the same time as not arousing O’Donovan’s suspicions that I might be up to something?”

“Thinking on your feet.”

Wyatt scrubbed a hand over his face.  “Jeez, man, you don’t make things easy.”

“So are you going to help me?”

Wyatt paused.  “You swear to me this will help Lucy?  And maybe save Jessica and Amy?”

Flynn nodded.  “Scout’s honor.”

“I don’t believe for one second you were ever a boy scout.”

There was a crackle from the speaker above Wyatt’s head, and the same disembodied voice announced, “End of Association.”

Flynn glanced up briefly.  “Out of time,” he said.  “And isn’t that ironic?”

“Hilarious,” Wyatt said, once again trying to get past Flynn.

And once again Flynn shoved him back against the wall.

“This is getting kinda old, man—” he started to complain, ducking abruptly as Flynn moved his mouth towards him.  “Hey!  What the hell—”

“Oh, sorry,” Flynn said with a grin.  “I was supposed to ask your permission first.”

“Two guesses what my answer’s gonna be.”

“You have to look…” Flynn paused as he sought out the correct word.  “…Used,” he said at length.  “If you want those prisoners out there to believe I’ve spent the last ten minutes in here making you my woman.”

Wyatt straightened.  “Who made _you_ the guy in this relationship?” he demanded. 

Flynn actually laughed at that, and wasn’t that just the weirdest thing?

“I guess I’m just more masculine,” he said.

“You really are asking to be punched again,” Wyatt commented, before shoving Flynn hard in the chest, and finally managing to maneuver past him and back out into the yard.

Toothless and Tattoos were just lining up with the other inmates, and Toothless wolf whistled them while Tattoos blew Wyatt a kiss.

“Next time, honey,” he said, just as O’Donovan appeared, nightstick already gripped in his hand.

“That’s him,” Wyatt said, and Flynn nodded.

“Time to get you noticed,” he said, without any warning whatsoever grabbing Wyatt around the waist, dipping him backwards and once again introducing his tongue to his mouth.

While in his head, Wyatt knew exactly what Flynn was up to this time, it didn’t stop him going completely rigid and having to resist the urge to knee him in the balls.

“Hate to interrupt you ladies…”

Suddenly there was a hand in his hair and a nightstick across his throat, and he was being yanked backwards, away from Flynn, who had an arm across his chest as one of the other prison officers grabbed him in an effort to break the two of them up.

“Sorry, sir,” Wyatt said, more out of habit than anything.

Although he couldn’t see O’Donovan’s face, by the feel of something that wasn’t his nightstick sticking in the small of his back, he was pretty sure Flynn’s display had gotten the guy’s attention.

“What did I tell you about disrespecting me?” O’Donovan demanded, yanking on Wyatt’s hair a little.

“Sir, not to, sir?” he suggested.

“Okay, you’re with me,” he snapped, as he gestured for his colleague to get Flynn in line with the other prisoners while he hauled Wyatt off in the opposite direction.

He glanced over his shoulder just once at Flynn, who nodded encouragingly at him.

Wyatt swallowed.  “Sir, I don’t think you’re—”

“Shut up, boy,” O’Donovan silenced him, half pulling him off his feet in his apparent rush to get him wherever the hell he was planning on taking him.  “You and I need to talk…”

*

Wyatt wasn’t entirely sure where he was being taken, but he made damn sure he memorized the route, as O’Donovan led him down worn stone steps to some kind of basement area.

There were steam pipes everywhere, and he figured maybe this was part of the heating system, and it suddenly occurred to him that if there was going to be a secret tunnel into the prison, this would be a great place to hide it.

O’Donovan shoved him roughly down the last few steps, as the staircase opened out into a cellar, a couple of doors off to the left of what looked like a gigantic furnace of some kind which dominated the room.

The noise from the pipes was quite deafening, and again Wyatt figured that would be pretty useful if you were trying to disguise the fact that there were guys down here having noisy relations with one another.

O’Donovan shoved him through one of the doors to his left, and Wyatt sincerely hoped there wasn’t an audition process involved in getting into the guy’s prostitution ring.

Once through the door, O’Donovan snapped on a light and closed the door, muffling the sound from outside while Wyatt found himself in what looked like an everyday living room, a couch and an armchair angled around an oil heater, a small coffee table, a drinks cabinet, and a cupboard with a gramophone on it, just like the one his Grandpa Sherwin used to have when he was a kid.

The only thing that looked vaguely out of place was the double bed over in the corner.

Wyatt swallowed.

Okay, this could be bad.

O’Donovan finally let go of him, circling around front and looking at him in a way that made his flesh crawl.

_Keep it together, Sergeant…_

“What’s your name, again, kid?” the prison officer asked.  “Reeves, was it?”

“Sir, yes sir,” Wyatt responded automatically, and O’Donovan raised an eyebrow.

“You really ex-military?”

Wyatt nodded.  “Yes, sir,” he replied politely, only then realizing he was standing in the at ease position with his hands behind his back.

O’Donovan nodded.  “That might be useful,” he said slowly, looking Wyatt up and down a few times.

Wyatt took a breath.

“I have a proposition for you,” the guard said at length.  “Wanna make some extra cash while you’re in here?”

Wyatt hesitated.  “Not sure how long I’m gonna be here, sir,” he said.  “I get arraigned on Monday.”

“Then take the opportunity I’m giving you,” O’Donovan said.  “I’m offering you cash money, and my guaranteed protection while ever you’re in this facility,” he said.  “And any work detail you want.”

Wyatt raised a brow.  “In exchange for?”

O’Donovan approached him slowly, reaching out and running his fingers through his hair.

Wyatt somehow managed not to flinch.

If he could put up with Garcia Flynn kissing him, then he could put up with this.

_For Lucy._

_For Jessica._

“Fate was smiling on me today, boy,” O’Donovan continued, and Wyatt sincerely wanted to laugh out loud at that one.  “You’re just what I need.”

*

Thankfully, there was no audition process.  Just a few questions to make sure Wyatt knew vaguely what he was getting into.

“You ever been with a guy?” had been O’Donovan’s first question, to which Wyatt had responded, “About ten minutes ago?”

After that, it was pretty much plain sailing.  He’d been informed he would have a “date” that night, that the guy was kind of rough, but Wyatt could totally be rough back if he wanted, and that he’d get five bucks and a couple packs of smokes for his trouble.  An extra couple of bucks if the guy got _too_ rough with him and left marks.

Five bucks didn’t sound a whole lot to Wyatt, but he figured with inflation, maybe that was a decent amount of cash for selling your virtue in 1963.

O’Donovan, to Wyatt’s surprise and great relief, had barely touched him throughout the interview, just the odd bit of hair stroking, a graze of his cheek, getting his lips very close to his ear, but nothing like what Wyatt had been half-expecting.

He guessed Flynn had been right: he liked to watch.

Considering O’Donovan was probably old enough to be his dad, in fact, probably old enough to be his _granddad_ in linear time, Wyatt was considerably relieved.

After the interview was over, he’d been marched back up to the main building and headed towards his cell, where he could see Romeo waiting patiently by the doorway. 

Possibly emboldened by O’Donovan’s obvious need for his services, he ventured to ask, “Any chance of moving cell, boss?  Now that I’m, y’know, under your protection?”

O’Donovan had said he couldn’t do that, but he went on ahead and spoke to Romeo, and whatever he said seemed to do the trick.  He didn’t come anywhere near Wyatt after the cell door locked behind him, and spent most of the next two hours just staring at him from his position on the single chair, while Wyatt tried to get some sleep prior to tonight’s adventure.

He woke up suddenly as the loudspeaker announced dinner, and found Romeo standing over him with an odd expression on his face and his hand somewhere on his person Wyatt really didn’t want to think too much about.

“Hey,” he managed to say, somehow getting up off his bunk and slinking around Romeo without having to actually touch him.  “Wonder if the food here’s any good?”

Once again, he stood in line until the guards marched them off toward what Wyatt presumed was going to be the mess hall.

This time, he had Tattoos behind him and Toothless in front of him, but Romeo had somehow gotten in the line behind Tattoos and appeared to be growling at him every time he put a hand anywhere near Wyatt, which Wyatt found kind of hilarious.

Yep, whatever O’Donovan had said to Romeo, Wyatt now appeared to have his own attack puppy following him around the place.

The mess hall was loud and crowded and didn’t smell particularly inviting, but when he got in line for what might loosely be described as “food” in some alternate universe, he noticed O’Donovan standing behind the convicts serving out the slop, and when Wyatt got to the front, O’Donovan nodded at the server, who appeared to give Wyatt an extra large portion.

Okay, maybe being a prostitute in an all-male prison in 1963 wasn’t going to be such a bad thing after all.

“Save some of that for me,” a distinctive voice breathed into his ear, and once again he was being manhandled by Flynn, who led him to a table in the corner where Redhead was already sitting.

“You’re touching me again,” Wyatt pointed out, depositing his tray on the table and grimacing when Flynn decided to sit down next to him rather than on the opposite side of the table with Reed.

“This is Robbie,” Flynn introduced him.  “Robbie, this is Wyatt.”

Robbie nodded at him once in acknowledgement.  “We met already.”

“Hey,” Wyatt said, attention distracted by Romeo sitting himself down at the next table and refusing to take his eyes off of him, even when he started to eat.

“New boyfriend?” Flynn asked, eyeing the man-mountain opposite.  “Think I might be jealous.”

“Cellmate,” Wyatt explained.  “Think O’Donovan told him to look after me.”

“Aw, that’s so sweet,” Flynn cooed sarcastically.  “I think that rather large bulge in the front of his pants is aimed in your direction, though.”

“Rufus said I’d be popular,” Wyatt murmured.

“Pretty boys in prison,” Flynn sniggered.  “You’re a total cliché, Wyatt Logan.”

“A cliché that got the gig you wanted,” Wyatt told him.  “Didn’t even have to demonstrate the things I can do with my tongue.”

That kind of stopped Flynn in his tracks, and he just glanced sideways at him for a very long moment.

“I’m kidding,” Wyatt added.  “Sorta.  I’ll let you decide.”

Flynn rolled his eyes.  “What time’s your date?”

“Hmm, O’Donovan wasn’t too specific.  Just said, ‘later.’”

“That could be a problem,” Flynn said.  “Robbie here is going to request my assistance tonight in the library, but we’re going to need to know when O’Donovan takes you to Mackie.”

“His ‘boudoir’ is behind the boiler room in the basement,” Wyatt explained.  “I think that’s maybe where the tunnel is.  That’s why he set up shop down there.”

“The library is just upstairs,” Robbie put in.  “We’ll be able to see you pass by on your way down.”

“Good,” Flynn said.  “Hate to think of you all alone with some guy who wants to jump your bones while another one watches.”

Wyatt shuddered again.  “You better show up, man,” he muttered.

“We’ll be there,” Flynn assured him.  “Now are you sure you know what to do?”

“Not really,” Wyatt admitted.  “But I’m hoping a solution will present itself.”

“Just remember not to get yourself violated,” Flynn added helpfully.

“Wasn’t planning on it,” Wyatt confirmed.

“Need you to be able to walk after.”

“Your concern for my wellbeing is heartwarming.”

Flynn’s gaze drifted to the middle distance for a second.  “This time tomorrow, we could have our families back,” he said.  “It could all be over.  All of this time travel nonsense.  Like it never happened.  It’ll never have happened.”

Wyatt blinked at him, and so did Robbie.

“Time travel?”

Wyatt coughed.  “Uh, he’s writing a science-fiction novel,” he covered lamely, while Flynn abruptly came back to himself after Wyatt kicked him under the table.

“Yes,” he agreed.  “Just working out the plot in my head.  Time travel sucks.”

“That it does,” Wyatt agreed.

Robbie nodded as he got up to leave.  “So I’ll see you in the library around eight,” he said, nodding to Flynn.  “You better be right about this.”

“I’m right,” Flynn assured him.  “This is going to work.  And then you’ll be able to get your revenge on Cahill.”

Robbie’s mouth tightened into a thin line.  “It’s not about revenge,” he said tightly.  “It’s about justice.”

And then he was gone, and Wyatt was left sitting at a table with Garcia Flynn while Romeo continued to gaze at him like he wanted to lick him all over.

“That guy is seriously freaking me out,” he murmured, trying not to make eye contact with his cellmate.

“I could throw you over the table and make him watch me make you squeal like a girl if you think it would help?” Flynn offered, and Wyatt wasn’t entirely sure whether he was joking or not.

“I think I’ll pass,” Wyatt told him, carefully.  Then, “What did you mean when you said if this works all this time travel nonsense will never have happened?”

Flynn met his gaze with an almost startled one of his own, as if he’d not realized he’d actually said that out loud.

He shrugged dismissively. 

“Nothing,” he said.  “Just imagining what it would be like to go back and change it all.”

Wyatt took a small bite of what might have been macaroni and cheese on his tray, grimaced, before asking, “And how did you get the idea to steal a time machine in the first place?”

Flynn held his gaze a little too long before mumbling, “Someone gave me something.  Put the idea in my head.”

“Who?” Wyatt asked.

And Flynn merely shrugged.  “You don’t know her,” he said, before turning his attention back to his own food.

So it was a woman.

Okay, that was interesting.

“Listen,” Flynn continued as if nothing had been said.  “Good luck tonight.  There’s a lot riding on you.”

“Oh, only the possibility of saving our families.  Not to mention protecting the future—and the past—from Rittenhouse.  But no pressure.”

“I’m serious,” Flynn said suddenly, grabbing Wyatt’s wrist and hanging on to it.  “When they say Mackie is into the ‘rough stuff’ I don’t know how rough they mean.  If it looks like he’s going to hurt you, don’t hesitate.  Fight back.  If you have to kill him to protect yourself, then do it.”

Wyatt frowned slightly.  “I’m not going to kill him,” he said.  “I’m perfectly capable of taking care of myself without having to resort to killing anyone.  Although I realize that might be an alien concept to you.”

Flynn swallowed.  “I’m just saying,” he said.  “Be careful.  I’d hate to be responsible for breaking Miss Preston’s favorite toy soldier.”

*

Okay, so Wyatt was nervous.

Wyatt was _really_ nervous.

In fact, he was probably even more nervous than he’d been the first time he went on a _real_ date.

He kept glancing at his wrist where his watch ought to have been and cursing that prisons seemed to like to deprive their inmates of any sense of time.

Which was pretty damned hilarious in Wyatt’s particular predicament.

Romeo had continued to stare at him relentlessly since they got back from dinner, to the point where Wyatt was actually _willing_ O’Donovan to come for him, just to get away from his cellmate.

When he’d just about given up hope of ever getting out of this cell, a key ground in the lock, and O’Donovan stood silhouetted in the doorway.

“You’re up, kid,” he said, and Wyatt got a little shakily to his feet.

“Fare thee well, Romeo,” he said, the behemoth continuing to stare at him unblinkingly, as if he totally didn’t get the joke.

Which, to be fair, he probably didn’t.

Shrugging at his cellmate’s seeming non-appreciation for his sense of humor, Wyatt followed O’Donovan out into the hallway, where the guard stopped him for a second, apparently to give him an appreciative once-over, before leading him off in the direction of the basement.

On passing the library, Wyatt made sure to ask O’Donovan some random question about how long he was supposed to spend on this “date,” just to make sure Flynn and Robbie heard him, completely zoning out of the guard’s reply until he said, “This one’s got stamina.  He might keep you all night,” which kind of made Wyatt zone right back in on the conversation.

“All night?” he echoed, not liking the note of alarm in his voice one bit.

“He likes to cuddle after,” O’Donovan added.

Wyatt gulped down a breath and silently told himself they’d be out of this place before the guy even had chance to ask him his name, with any luck.

Everything was going to be _fine_.  He was Delta Force, for crying out loud.

His mind wandered to that village elder back during his first tour in Afghanistan who totally wouldn’t take “no” for an answer, and his wife, who taught him his first word of Persian.  Which happened to be the Persian word for “threesome.”

So he’d been nineteen and had managed to get out of that one without having to compromise his virtue.

Granted, mostly thanks to his female sergeant who taught him the Persian for, “no,” “get your hand off my ass,” and “touch me again and I’ll break your fingers.”

This was thirteen years and a whole bunch of guys trying to hit on him later, so he could totally handle this.

Totally.

He gulped down another shaky breath as O’Donovan bundled him into the fake living room by the furnace, the heater and the light already glowing, and a man sat in the armchair with his coat and hat still on.

He stood as Wyatt and O’Donovan entered the room, casting his eyes over Wyatt dispassionately at first, but seeming to grow more appreciative the longer he looked.  Particularly when his roving gaze reached Wyatt’s eyes.

“Mr. Mackie,” O’Donovan said.  “Sorry to keep you waiting.”

Mackie nodded his head slightly.  “That’s quite all right, Patrick,” he said.  “I think it was worth the wait for this one.”

O’Donovan lightly stroked Wyatt’s hair, and he really had to grit his teeth and bite back a “Will you _please_ stop doing that!” because he was _supposed_ to be willing and obedient, goddammit.

“Fresh in today.”  Wyatt suddenly realized O’Donovan was talking about him.  “Thought of you the second I saw him.”

Mackie stripped out of his overcoat and removed his hat, tossing both onto the armchair, finally allowing Wyatt a chance to size up the opposition.

He was maybe an inch taller than Wyatt, thinning hair over an angular face, and a physique that hinted at a man who had been particularly athletic in his younger days, but had let himself go a little more recently.  He was still built, though.  Broad shouldered in a way that suggested maybe he’d played football as a young man, and it briefly crossed Wyatt’s mind that if this guy did, indeed, like the “rough stuff,” he might have to get rough himself if only out of self-preservation.

“What’s your name, son?” the guy asked, taking a step toward him but not offering to touch.

Wyatt resisted the urge to step back, and managed to answer, “Wyatt,” in a strangled way that was very unbecoming of a soldier.  “Sir,” he added.

The guy looked to be in his late 50s, early 60s maybe, and Flynn had said he was ex-military, which, doing some quick math in his head, had Wyatt putting him possibly as a veteran of the Second World War, and, despite the situation he found himself in, Wyatt couldn’t help but respond to that with some kind of deference and respect.

Mackie squinted at him.  “You military, son?” he asked.

“Sir, yes sir,” Wyatt replied automatically.

“Korea?”

Wyatt again started to do math in his head.  “Yes, sir,” he confirmed.

Mackie nodded.  “Good man,” he said.  “Sorry to see you in a place like this.”

Wyatt shrugged.  “One of those things, sir,” he said, and Mackie nodded.

Then he reached out a hand and touched Wyatt’s cheek, and Wyatt was suddenly hyper-aware of O’Donovan still standing behind him.

“You can call me Bill, if you’d like to,” Mackie said, slipping off his jacket and loosening his tie.

Wyatt swallowed.

O’Donovan nudged him with one shoulder.  “Maybe you could help Mr. Mackie with that, son,” he suggested.

Wyatt glanced over his shoulder at him.  “Sir, I got this,” he lied.  “You don’t have to stay.”

O’Donovan smiled the most horrifying smile Wyatt thought he’d ever seen in his life.  “Oh yes I do, son,” he said, settling himself down on the couch.

Wyatt glanced at Mackie, who shrugged.  “Like you said, son.  One of those things,” he said.  “You get used to it after a while.”

Wyatt glanced at O’Donovan, noted his nightstick positioned on his right-hand side and the outline of what could very well have been a .22 in his right trouser pocket.

And then his attention was drawn back to Mackie by the guy’s hand on his cheek angling his face back in his direction.

“Come on, son,” he said.  “Get with the program.  Don’t have all night.”

While Wyatt wasn’t entirely sure that was true, he figured undressing the client was probably preferable to the client undressing _him_ , so he proceeded to unfasten his tie very slowly in the hopes he could drag this out until he could figure out the best way to do this.

Mackie seemed absolutely fascinated with Wyatt’s eyes, which wasn’t such a bad thing as it meant he wasn’t paying attention to much else.

Once his tie was off, Wyatt spied the drinks cabinet and asked casually, “Can I get you a drink, sir?”

Mackie’s attention slid from Wyatt’s eyes to his mouth at the sound of his voice, and the hand on his cheek became fingers tracing the outline of his lips.

 _You can do this, you can totally do this,_ a little voice in Wyatt’s head attempted to convince him, and he found himself half-hoping Flynn would burst into the room early, before Wyatt had put O’Donovan out of commission, if only to get this guy to stop touching him.

“Sir?” he prompted.  “Drink?”

Mackie blinked a couple of times, as if coming back to himself, and O’Donovan put in, “Mr. Mackie doesn’t drink, son,” before the client himself suddenly swallowed hard, gulped in a breath, and said, “Bourbon.  Neat.”

Wyatt glanced from Mackie to O’Donovan, who seemed surprised but didn’t comment further, before heading over to the drinks cabinet and pouring the client a triple Jim Beam.

 _I’m hoping a solution will present itself,_ his earlier words rang in his head, and he hoped to God this might be the solution he was looking for.

Turning, he expected to find Mackie where he’d left him, on the other side of the room, but instead he was right behind him, so close Wyatt almost spilled his drink all over him.

As if reading his mind, Mackie said, his voice low and kind of seductive, which was all kinds of disturbing, “If you’d spilled that on me, I might have had to make you lick it off.”

Had anyone else said that to him, Wyatt might have thought they were joking.  This guy?  Totally not sure either way.

He smiled awkwardly.  “Uh—” he began to stammer, before Mackie suddenly added, “Maybe I should spill some on you instead.”  He was looking Wyatt up and down in a way that didn’t have his flesh wanting to crawl off his bones, not at all.  “I think licking _you_ might be even more entertaining.”

Somehow he managed to shove Wyatt against the drinks cabinet without even spilling his drink, his free hand on Wyatt’s ass and his mouth suddenly on his neck.

Wyatt blew out a breath very slowly.

_You can totally do this.  Don’t kick him in the balls.  You need him on your side._

He flinched as Mackie’s teeth sank into his neck, and tried his best not to yelp like he had when Flynn had bitten him earlier.

Mackie pulled away and just looked at him, before throwing back the entire glass of bourbon in one go.

“I thought you didn’t drink?” Wyatt pointed out.

Mackie shrugged again.  “I do tonight,” he said, holding out his glass for a refill.

Wyatt took it, kind of nervous to turn his back on the guy, but figuring if he wanted to get him to show him the way out of here, there were worse ways to do it than by getting him blind drunk.

And if he didn’t generally drink?  Then maybe it wouldn’t take so long or be too hard.

Unlike Mackie himself who, when Wyatt turned his back on him to get him another drink, pushed himself right up against him just to prove exactly how long and hard he was.

Wyatt’s hands were actually shaking when he poured Mackie his second triple, before changing his mind and making it a quadruple.

When he tried to turn back, however, Mackie held him in place by continuing to pin him against the drinks cabinet, and there was a split second of panic when the guy’s hand went to the buttons on Wyatt’s work shirt and started not so much unfastening them as ripping them off.

Forcing what he hoped was a seductive smile, he managed to say, “You’re going to make me spill your drink if you’re not careful.”

Mackie snorted, taking the glass out of Wyatt’s hand without allowing him to turn around, and handing it back to him empty a couple of seconds later.

Wyatt glanced at the bottle of Jim Beam and fervently hoped there was going to be enough in there to get Mackie suitably wasted.

By the time Wyatt had poured Mackie’s third, his shirt was completely untucked and unfastened and Mackie’s fingers were slipping under the hem of his t-shirt and up over his stomach.

Wyatt fought back the urge to retch, steadied his hands and passed the glass back to Mackie, who again downed it without it seeming to touch the sides.

Then his mouth was on Wyatt’s neck again, his hand flattening against his stomach and pulling him back to increase contact, and the little voice in Wyatt’s head suddenly sounded very much like a warning klaxon that seemed to get louder and louder as Mackie started tugging at his shirt to get it off his shoulders.

 _“Remember not to get yourself violated,”_ he heard Flynn’s voice in his head, and he took the opportunity to twist so that he was once again facing Mackie, just as the older guy managed to yank his shirt down over his arms, and Wyatt had to struggle to get out of the sleeves or risk finding himself completely immobile and helpless.

Again forcing a smile, he managed to say, “Hey, I thought we were doing you first,” as he undid the top couple of buttons on Mackie’s shirt, and that at least seemed to distract him from further trying to get Wyatt naked for a second.

“Anyone ever tell you, you have the most beautiful eyes?” Mackie said, his own eyelids sliding languidly to half-mast.

“Maybe once or twice,” Wyatt said, turning briefly to grab the older guy another drink, which he took, downed, and proceeded to press his mouth to Wyatt’s, as if he wanted to share the taste.

Wyatt managed to disengage his lips and get the glass off of him at the same time, and Mackie went back to nuzzling his neck, as Wyatt suddenly found himself glancing over at O’Donovan, who said, “He’s still gonna want to screw you, even if he’s blind drunk, sweetheart.”

“I think I want to keep you forever,” Mackie was murmuring into Wyatt’s collarbone, meanwhile, and Wyatt figured this was as good a time as any to move things along a little, now that the alcohol appeared to be doing its job.

“You know,” he said, maneuvering Mackie back a step, towards O’Donovan’s position on the couch, “maybe we could do something about that,” he finished, shoving at Mackie’s chest so that he toppled backwards, suddenly finding himself sitting next to the prison guard.

O’Donovan raised an eyebrow, but didn’t comment, especially when Wyatt put his hands on Mackie’s knees, ran his fingers up his thighs, then proceeded to straddle his lap.

Mackie made a strangled sound that Wyatt might have mistaken for the guy having a coronary, but was pretty sure was actually drunken arousal, and he leaned down so that his mouth was at Mackie’s right ear, biting the earlobe slightly before whispering low enough that O’Donovan wouldn’t be able to hear, “Maybe you could take me away from all this?  Sir?” he added, seeing as the old guy kinda seemed to like that.

He grit his teeth and bit back some very bad curse words as Mackie grabbed at his ass and murmured, “Yes, son.  Let me take you away from all this.”

“Uh-huh,” Wyatt said.  “Anywhere you want to go.  Anything you want to do to me.”

And just as Wyatt started to figure things were finally going his way, Mackie suddenly grabbed his shoulders so hard he actually yelped, and before he knew what was happening he’d been flipped onto his back, his head half in O’Donovan’s lap and Mackie suddenly on top of him, not even pretending to kiss him anymore, just out and out licking his neck while his hand slid down over his t-shirt and below the waistband of his boxers.

He did his best not to cry out as Mackie’s other hand went to his throat and started to squeeze, seeing stars for a second as he scrabbled to get the guy’s claw-like fingers off of his windpipe.

“Told you he liked the rough stuff,” O’Donovan commented, once again stroking at his hair, and that was as far as this was going, as far as Wyatt was concerned.

So much for seducing Mackie into showing him the way out of here.

Managing to get his left hand free, Wyatt scrabbled behind him for O’Donovan’s nightstick, his fingers finally finding the grip and yanking it free of its holster.

“Hey!” O’Donovan protested, but not before Wyatt managed to crack Mackie to the side of his head with it, not hard enough to render him unconscious, just hard enough to get him the hell off of him.

Mackie grunted, falling slightly sideways and off of the majority of Wyatt’s torso, enough so that Wyatt was able to make a valiant attempt at getting upright, which, unfortunately, was scuppered by O’Donovan, who had other ideas, pushing down on Wyatt’s shoulder with one hand and grabbing at his wrist and twisting it back against the couch with the other, squeezing until the bones felt like they were grinding against one another and Wyatt was forced to drop the nightstick with a pained yell.

Mackie, by this point, had gotten his second wind, and actually started to laugh as he fisted a hand in the shoulder of Wyatt’s t-shirt and tried to drag him bodily back down the couch so that he could get on top of him again.

“Oh honey, you’ve got moxie!” Mackie burst out, “I like that!” and Wyatt heard the distinct sound of fabric tearing as he scrabbled for purchase against the couch cushions, the hand not currently being gripped by O’Donovan finding its way to the guard’s pocket, where he managed to wrench out the .22 and fire two shots into the ceiling in rapid succession.

Both Mackie and O’Donovan immediately stopped what they were doing, Mackie’s hands frozen on Wyatt’s hips, where they’d been struggling to get his jeans down without having the patience to unfasten them properly first, and O’Donovan still clenching Wyatt’s wrist like his life depended on it.

“Get off of me,” Wyatt demanded first of O’Donovan, who slowly released his hold on him, allowing Wyatt to sit up and turn the gun on Mackie.  “You too,” he added, trying desperately to get his breathing under control or he wasn’t going to be able to aim this gun for crap.

Mackie backed off, crouching by Wyatt’s knees, hands raised and a besotted grin plastered to his face.  “Want to take you home,” he said shortly, and Wyatt wasn’t entirely sure whether that was the drink talking.

“Might piss off your wife a little,” he suggested, snatching up O’Donovan’s nightstick once again and pinning his head to the couch with it by means of shoving it across his throat.

“Whatever you’re planning,” the guard said, his voice sounding somewhat strangled, “it won’t work.”

“Oh, I’m not planning anything,” Wyatt said, glancing down at his torn shirt and trying to figure out how to get his jeans back up over his hips without dropping the gun he had on Mackie or the nightstick he had on O’Donovan.  “But _he_ is.”

Exactly on cue, Flynn came bursting into the room, blinking at Wyatt who must have looked quite a sight, half undressed, his neck bleeding from Mackie’s teeth and his shoulder bleeding from his nails.

“You were supposed to secure him!” Flynn snapped, gesturing at O’Donovan.

Wyatt took a breath, still trying to stop himself hyperventilating.  “Screw you, man, he’s secure,” he snapped back, and if Flynn noticed the hand wrapped around the nightstick was shaking, he didn’t comment on it.

Instead, he took the nightstick out of Wyatt’s hand before lifting O’Donovan up off of the couch and dragging him over to the bed, where he proceeded to secure his wrists to the headboard with the cord from the lamp on the nightstand.

“Get your goddamn hands off me!” O’Donovan swore, and for a second Flynn looked like he was going to make all of the guard’s filthiest dreams come true when he bent down as if he was going to kiss him; but instead he cracked him over the head with his own nightstick.

Satisfied he was suitably unconscious, Flynn doubled back to Wyatt’s position, yelling, “Robbie, get in here!” as he passed the door.

As Robbie appeared in the doorway, Flynn turned his attention to Wyatt, who was still holding the gun on Mackie.

For a second, Flynn didn’t say anything, then, “You okay, Sergeant?”  And he actually sounded genuinely concerned.

Wyatt gulped down another breath, fairly satisfied his heartrate was approaching something vaguely related to normal.  “Never been better,” he said, trying to hitch his jeans back up into place one-handed while Mackie watched, apparently riveted.

“Did he tell you where the tunnel is?” Flynn asked, and Wyatt shook his head.

“Just getting to that part,” he said.

Flynn frowned at him.  “We said two shots when you were ready, not two shots when you’d barely accomplished anything.”

Wyatt scowled at him.  “Well excuse me for not wanting to get _violated_ ,” he said.  “This guy—” he gestured at Mackie with the .22, “—is a helluva lot stronger than he looks.”

“I am,” Mackie agreed a little drunkenly.  “Want to be strong for you.  Want to make you my boy.  Can I tie you up?  Let me tie you up...”

Wyatt swallowed again, and Flynn sniggered.

“Go on, Wyatt,” he said.  “Let the poor guy tie you up if he wants to.”

Wyatt’s scowl deepened, before he returned his attention to Mackie.  “Maybe later, sir,” he said, getting shakily to his feet and pulling Mackie up with him.  “When you get me home.  I’ll let you do anything you want to me, huh?”

Mackie gazed at him and snorted.  “Want to lick you like ice cream,” he said shortly.  “Want to lick chocolate sauce off of you.”

Wyatt raised an eyebrow and shoved Mackie’s hand off his ass.  “That sounds—sticky,” he commented. “Maybe when we get home, sir,” he added.  “But you need to show me the way first.”

Wyatt waited, barely daring to breathe, while Mackie studied his face, frowning.

Wyatt had lost count of how many bourbons the guy had downed, but was pretty sure he was at least well on the way to wasted.

“Okay,” Mackie said at length.  “I get you home and I can do what I want to you, right?”

Wyatt nodded encouragingly.  “Anything you like.  For as long as you like.  You just need to show me the way.”

Mackie clutched at the fabric at Wyatt’s shoulder.  “Forever?  Want to keep you.”

Wyatt glanced at Flynn, who was stifling a smug snigger.  “Yes, sir.  You can keep me.  Now let’s just get out of here, huh?”

Mackie glanced at Flynn as if seeing him for the first time.  “Who’s your friend?” he asked.

Wyatt shook his head as he maneuvered Mackie toward the door.  “He’s no one,” he said.

“He’s almost as pretty as you are,” Mackie commented.  “Does he want to come home with us too?”

It was Wyatt’s turn to snigger.  “Yes he does, sir.”

“Mmm, threesome,” Mackie commented.

“Weird that I know the word for that in at least eight languages,” Wyatt suddenly realized, guiding Mackie through the door and out into the furnace room.  “Now which way do we go home, sir?” he asked.

Mackie indicated the other door to the left.  “That way,” he said.  “I feel a little lightheaded.  Did I have a drink?  I’m not supposed to have alcohol with this medication the witch doctors have got me on.”

_Ah._

“No, sir, no booze for you,” Wyatt said, once again removing Mackie’s hand from his ass.  “I think maybe we just need to get you home and get you something to eat.  Low blood sugar, maybe.”

“Mm,” Mackie agreed, leaning against Wyatt as he murmured, “Chocolate sauce,” distractedly.

*

As Wyatt had suspected, the escape tunnel was an old steam tunnel, now disused and forgotten, partially grown over with weeds and tree roots and all kinds of old detritus that seemed to have been blown or washed in here.

It had taken three narrow staircases and a partially blocked doorway before Mackie had finally shown them the entrance to the tunnel, and Wyatt was pretty damn impressed the old guy could remember his way back here, considering how shitfaced he was.  Although it was clearly the prescription drug / alcohol mix that was really doing a number on him.  Wyatt felt kind of bad for doing that to him, so much so that by the fifth time he’d removed the old guy’s hand from his ass, he kind of gave up and just let him leave it there.

“I think Mr. Mackie likes you, Wyatt,” Flynn commented from over his shoulder.

“Nobody asked you, _Garcia_ ,” Wyatt returned.  “What kind of name is that anyway? Were your parents sadists or just idiots?”

He could feel Flynn silently fuming without even turning to look at him, and he got an odd satisfaction out of that, even if his tormenting him wasn’t nearly as extreme as what Flynn had put Wyatt through tonight.

“I hope we’re nearly there,” Mackie said suddenly.  He’d been leaning heavily on Wyatt throughout the excursion, and Wyatt was starting to wonder whether it was more for the opportunity to feel him up than the physical support he was offering.

“Don’t you know?” he asked carefully. 

Mackie shrugged.  “It’s dark,” he said, by way of explanation.  “Can’t see for shit.”

Wyatt didn’t disagree.  Flynn and Robbie had thought to bring flashlights, but they weren’t that much in the way of assistance.

“So where were you stationed during the war, sir?” Wyatt asked, hoping to get Mackie’s thoughts away from the long list of foodstuffs he appeared to have been considering licking off various parts of Wyatt’s anatomy for most of the journey through the tunnel.

“Oh, I got around, son,” he said.  “Although mostly Europe.  I keep meaning to publish my memoirs.  I kept an extensive journal of my time spent in battle.  I figured someone might want to read it someday.”

Wyatt nearly made a crack about Flynn and his apparent devotion to Lucy’s journal, but he stopped himself before the words could get out.

_Someone gave me something.  Put the idea in my head...  You don’t know her..._

Something about all this had been scratching at the back of Wyatt’s brain all day.

 _Someone_ had given Lucy’s journal to Flynn.

 _That_ had been the catalyst for Flynn stealing the Mothership so he could travel through time to try and eradicate Rittenhouse and save his family.

If that person had never given Flynn the journal, none of this time travel business would have happened.

_It will never have happened._

Which meant...

“I think we’re here,” Flynn announced suddenly, as Wyatt found himself stepping onto grass instead of brick, the tunnel opening out into an overgrown dried up old creek bed.  He glanced behind himself, at Flynn and Robbie exiting the tunnel, and it just looked like they were coming out of some old storm drain and he wasn’t at all surprised no one had ever gone exploring and found themselves in the middle of a high security prison.

Wyatt stopped moving for a second, studied Flynn’s expression.  Thought about what he’d let slip earlier...

“My car’s around here somewhere,” Mackie said suddenly, and Wyatt came back to himself and his current situation, the practical part of his brain taking the wheel for a second.

It didn’t take long to find Mackie’s Oldsmobile, although having to fish in the old guy’s trouser pockets to find the keys caused Wyatt to grimace distastefully, especially when Mackie took that as a signal to slam him up against the side of the car and start humping his hip and biting his shoulder where he’d previously torn his t-shirt.

“Whoa there, Grandpa!” Flynn intervened, pulling Mackie off Wyatt long enough for him to get the passenger side door open.  “Wait, what are you doing?” he asked suddenly.

Wyatt blinked at him.  “Well we can’t just leave the guy here,” he said, trying to keep Mackie’s hands off him long enough to get him into the car.

“You’re not seriously considering driving him home, are you?” Flynn scoffed.

“Well he can’t exactly drive himself.”

“Leave him in the car, then.  Let him sleep it off.”

“In case you hadn’t noticed, he’s not exactly sleepy.”

“And he can hear you,” Mackie mumbled against Wyatt’s shoulder.  “And he’s still horny.”

Flynn frowned.  “You still have O’Donovan’s gun?”

Wyatt blinked at him.  “What?” he burst out.  “We’re not _killing_ him!”

“He tried to rape you,” Flynn pointed out. 

“And he thought he was paying for the privilege!”

“And that makes it alright?”

Wyatt had no answer for that.  “Look,” he said, managing to maneuver Mackie into such a position that he could wrap his arms around the old guy’s neck.  “Maybe we just put him to sleep.”

It didn’t take a whole lot of pressure on the specific nerve bundle before Mackie crumpled in Wyatt’s arms, and he was able to manhandle him into the front seat of the car.

“See?” he said, closing the door behind him.  “No need to kill anybody.  Vulcan neck pinch.  Works every time.”

Flynn considered him for a second.  “Are you _sure_ you’re Delta Force?”

Wyatt sighed.  “Are you sure you’re human?” he returned.

Flynn snorted.  “Touché,” he said.  He turned in Robbie’s direction, the redhead looking a little bit lost as he suddenly found himself at liberty for the first time in two years.  “So Robbie,” he said.  “Ready to go get yourself some justice?”

Robbie took a slow breath.  “Cahill and his family.  They’re asking for it,” he said.  “Get me near them and I’ll do it.  I’ll do them all.”

Wyatt wasn’t entirely sure he was comfortable with any of this.  Sure, he’d been happy—ish—to go along with Flynn if it meant getting out of jail with his virtue intact, but now it came down to it, he wasn’t sure he could just stand by and let Flynn kill a _child_.

“What did you mean?” he said slowly, taking a step closer to Flynn while he rubbed at his bare arms in the chill early morning air.  “When you said Robbie killing Cahill and his family would mean it would never have happened?”

Flynn returned his gaze evenly, paused for a second, then shrugged dismissively.  “Heat of the moment,” he said.  “I didn’t mean anything.”

Wyatt took another step towards him.  “I think you did,” he said.  “I think you meant something very specific.”

Flynn continued to meet his gaze, his face completely blank and unreadable.

“Who gave you Lucy’s journal, Flynn?” Wyatt continued.  “If Robbie kills Cahill, how will that stop you getting your hands on it?”

Flynn shifted from one foot to the other, his face still blank but his body language completely otherwise.

“I don’t know what you mean,” Flynn said evenly.  “The one thing has nothing to do with the other.”

Wyatt took another step towards him, and he was maybe an arm’s length away by this point.  “Oh, but I think it does,” he said.  “You said if Robbie managed to kill the Cahills, none of this time travel stuff would have happened.  And it happened because _someone_ —a _female_ someone—gave you Lucy’s journal.”

Flynn neither confirmed nor denied, but finally looked away, his eyes seeking out anything other than Wyatt’s.

“How will killing the Cahills stop that female someone from giving you Lucy’s journal?” Wyatt pressed.

Flynn still didn’t answer, and Wyatt took another step towards him.

“How will killing the Cahills prevent Lucy a lot of heartache?”

Another step, and Wyatt was at Flynn’s shoulder.

“What does Cahill’s son do to hurt Lucy, Flynn?”

Flynn still didn’t answer, wouldn’t look at Wyatt, made to move away from him, but Wyatt grabbed his shirt and held on, held him fast, wouldn’t let him get away that easily.

He pulled Flynn right up to him and hissed, “How will killing Cahill’s son help Lucy?  Huh?  You better tell me, or so help me God—” and before Wyatt knew exactly what he was doing, O’Donovan’s .22 was in his hand, the barrel pressed against Flynn’s temple.

Flynn froze.

But maintained his silence.

Wyatt took a breath.  “Did Lucy give you the journal?”

Flynn’s eyes actually slid sideways to meet Wyatt’s at that.  He didn’t look scared, exactly, but he did look distinctly uncomfortable, as if he’d been caught in a lie and wasn’t sure how to talk his way out of it.

Wyatt shook Flynn’s shoulder, reaffirming his grip on the handgun, before demanding, “ _Tell_ me!”

“It’s not a good idea to know too much about your future,” was all Flynn would offer.

Wyatt nodded.  “It’s not _my_ future I’m asking about,” he said.  “It’s _hers_.”

Flynn continued to hold his gaze calmly, but Wyatt could see something starting to unravel behind his eyes.  Something small, barely there, something he wanted to tell Wyatt but couldn’t.

“Flynn?” and even to Wyatt, his voice sounded kind of desperate.  “Did Lucy give you the journal?  You said sometimes she sounded like a different Lucy when she wrote in it.  Was it the other Lucy?  The different Lucy?”  He swallowed, considering his next question carefully.  “A future Lucy?”

Flynn blinked at him, a muscle tightening in his cheek the only thing giving anything away.

Wyatt took a breath.

“And in what possible set of circumstances would killing Cahill’s son stop Lucy-from-the-future giving you her journal?”

Flynn finally averted his gaze, looking at anything but Wyatt.

Wyatt swallowed.  “Unless killing Ethan Cahill’s son stops Lucy from existing.”

Flynn’s eyes shifted back to Wyatt’s, and it was all there.  All of it.

And Wyatt realized with a jolt that he was right.  That the thing scratching at the back of his head all day...  He’d been right.

“Cahill’s her grandfather?” he asked carefully, not really expecting an answer and not getting one.  “Flynn?”  He shoved the .22 into Flynn’s temple a little bit more insistently, and he flinched, but still didn’t offer to speak.  “You think that’ll save her some heartache?” he asked, his voice cracking a little on the last word.  “Take away her pain?  By taking away her life?  Taking away her _existence_?”

Flynn blinked at him, bit his lip, shook his head, and finally burst out, “It drives her mad, Wyatt!  Being Benjamin Cahill’s daughter!  You don’t even know.  You didn’t see!  You didn’t _see_ her like that—”

“Like _what_?” Wyatt demanded.  “An old woman?”

“A very, very _disturbed_ old woman!” Flynn clarified.  “I listened to her because I didn’t know her.  At that point, I’d never met Lucy Preston.  The first time I met her she was 67 years old and was pressing her journal into my hand and telling me I had to save the world if I wanted to save my family!”

“And this is how you undo what you’ve done?” Wyatt demanded, feeling the anger coiling in his chest like a living, burning thing.  “This is how you fix what you’ve broken trying to fix everything else?”

Flynn shook his head.  “Nothing works!” he burst out, gesturing helplessly with his arms.  “ _Nothing!_   And I’ve tried _everything_!  Nothing brings them back!  I change things, kill people, erase people from existence and they’re _still dead_!  You _know_!  You of _all_ people know!  You’ve tried to bring Jessica back how many times now?”

Wyatt swallowed.

“You think I didn’t know about the telegram you sent in Vegas?  The letters you mailed her from every time period where the US Postal Service exists prior to that day in 2012?  Wyatt, you could go back in time, you could kill the man who killed her, kill his parents, kill _their_ parents, and I guarantee you _it will not change a thing!_ ”

“Shut up!” Wyatt yelled, drilling the .22 into Flynn’s forehead.  “Shut the hell up!  You don’t know anything about Jessica!  You don’t know anything about how she died, how it’s _my fault_ , how I can _fix it_ —”

Completely disregarding the handgun pointed at his head, Flynn grabbed Wyatt by the shoulders and shook him.

“You _can’t_ save her!” he yelled.  “I _guarantee_ it!  I don’t know whether it’s Fate, God, Time.  I _don’t know_.  I just know that _nothing_ I do brings my family back to me!  I’ve made things so, so much worse and now I need to _undo_ it all!”

“By making sure Lucy doesn’t exist?  By making sure she doesn’t give you her journal, tell you about time travel, set you on this path in the first place?”

Flynn nodded.  “She has to die, Wyatt.  Lucy has to cease to be.  To stop all this.”

Wyatt nodded.

Took a breath.

Aimed the .22 and shot Robert Reed in the head.

It’s funny how in times of stress we sometimes don’t even remember what we did.

Wyatt had killed people before and barely remembered pulling the trigger.

Other times, he couldn’t seem to forget their faces.  Dead eyes looking at him.

This time, he didn’t feel anything for Robert Reed.

The way he slumped down onto the grassy bank, an oddly accepting expression on his face, as if he’d known this was coming.

What he _would_ remember was the expression on Garcia Flynn’s face.  As if Wyatt had finally done something that had surprised him.

“You’re not killing Lucy,” Wyatt said, the hand holding the .22 not even shaking.  “I won’t let you.”

He pointed the gun directly at Flynn’s forehead this time.

Took a steadying breath.

And pulled the trigger.

The gun clicked onto empty and Wyatt almost laughed.

He could hear Flynn’s heartbeat; heard him gulp in a breath.

“Time.  Fate.  The Universe,” Flynn said slowly, sounding less sure of himself than Wyatt had ever heard him.  “Seems someone doesn’t want me dead today.”

“Then I’ll kill you tomorrow,” Wyatt said, still pointing the gun in Flynn’s direction.  “Or the next day.  Or, hell, last week.  Last year.  A hundred years ago.  You go anywhere near Lucy or one of her ancestors again?  I’ll come find you myself.  Your parents.  Your brother.  I might even go back in time and kill your wife and daughter a day before Rittenhouse, just to spoil their fun.”  He tossed the gun away, grabbed Flynn’s shirt and shook him hard.  “Do you hear me?”

He didn’t sound angry.  Or emotional.  Or desperate.  Not any of those things he’d felt in the last twenty-four hours.

He almost sounded matter-of-fact.  Calm.  Clinical.

“Flynn?” he said again.  “Do you _hear_ me?”

Flynn breathed out slowly, hands raised slightly, mouth a tight line.

He hadn’t seemed afraid before.

Not of Wyatt.

But he did now.

He nodded his head very slightly.

“I promise,” he said.  “I’ll stay away from Lucy.”

“And her ancestors,” Wyatt insisted.

Flynn nodded, and for some reason, Wyatt believed him.

“You don’t need to kill everybody,” he said.  “If you’re serious about undoing some of the damage you’ve done, maybe that’s something you need to figure out for yourself.”

Flynn nodded slightly.  “Lucy’s lucky to have you,” he said softly.  “Looking out for her.”

Wyatt shrugged.  “That’s my job,” he said.  “To protect her.”

Flynn indicated the grip Wyatt still had on his shirt.  “I suspect she’s a little bit more than just a job to you, Sergeant,” he said.

Wyatt abruptly released the hold he had on Flynn and took a step away from him.  What he was saying may well have been true, but Wyatt was in no way ready to consider that possibility yet.  Not yet.  He at least had to _try_ to save Jessica first.

“So are we done here?” Flynn asked.

“Are you gonna leave the Cahills alone?”

Flynn nodded.  “You have my word.”

“At least until after Lucy’s born,” Wyatt added.  “After that, if they’re really the monsters you say they are, then have at it.”

Flynn nodded again.  “Nice working with you again, Sergeant,” he said.  “I look forward to our next kiss.”

Wyatt ground his teeth and shook his head.  “Over my dead body.”

Flynn grinned sardonically at him.  “Well at least I remembered to ask first.”

*

It took Wyatt an hour to walk back to the rendezvous location where he’d left Rufus and the Lifeboat.

And Lucy.

Despite knowing there was absolutely nothing she could do to help Wyatt on his solo assignment, Lucy had insisted she come along.  Even if it meant sitting in the Lifeboat with Rufus for a couple of days.

He never thought he’d be so happy to see that old bucket of bolts again.

“Hey!” he called out, rapping insistently on the side of the time machine.  It was 5am and he was freezing cold, starving hungry, and all he could think about was going home to bed.  His own bed.  Where there wasn’t a sexed-up giant lying in the bunk above him or guys lining up around the block to show him a good time that he undoubtedly would not have found in the slightest bit good.

He waited for a minute, wondering whether maybe Lucy and Rufus had decided to spend the night in a hotel rather than waiting for him within the cramped confines of the Lifeboat, but then the hatch whooshed open and Lucy was suddenly falling into his arms, her own arms wrapped around his neck as she practically threw herself out of the Lifeboat at him.

“Oh my God, you’re okay, you’re okay, you’re okay!” she repeated, hanging onto him like she hadn’t seen him in a hundred years.

Which, in their line of work, was occasionally a possibility.

“Morning to you too,” he said, blinking at her, a little in surprise and a little in…something else entirely.

She’d still not released her death grip on him by the time Rufus appeared in the hatchway, yawning loudly and looking distinctly rumpled, as if he’d just woken up.

“Hey, man,” he said.  “Glad to see you’re not dead.”  He blinked then, as if his brain was only just starting to catch up with his mouth at last.  “Hey, you’re—still intact, right?  No... shenanigans?”

Wyatt frowned at him.  “Well I’m still not a virgin, if that’s what you’re asking me,” he said.

Which was when Lucy noticed his torn shirt, the scratches on his shoulder and the bite marks on his neck.

“What the hell happened to you?” she demanded, finally letting go of him and taking a step back to inspect the damage.  “Are you okay?  Did they hurt you?  Who did this?  Did you fight back?  How many of them were there?  Did you—”

“Hey,” Wyatt put his hand on Lucy’s shoulder.

“—see Flynn?”

“Hey!” Wyatt repeated a little louder.

Lucy blinked at him and paused to take a breath.

“Firstly, I’m fine.  Secondly, no, only my pride.  Thirdly, Flynn and some old guy.”  He screwed his eyes shut for a second while he tried to remember the rest of Lucy’s questions.  “Uhh.  Yes.  Lots.  Yes.  That about cover it?”

Lucy took another breath.  “I guess so,” she said.  Then, “ _Flynn_ did this to you?” indicating the bite marks and the scratches.

Wyatt shrugged.

“You figure out what Flynn was up to?” Rufus asked.

“Yeah.  Kinda.  Can I come in, I’m kinda freezing my ass off out here.”

“Where’s your shirt?” Lucy demanded.  “I know what convicts wear in 1963 and you should have been issued a work shirt.”

Wyatt shrugged.  “Lost it.”

“How?”  When Wyatt didn’t answer, Lucy folded her arms and stood in front of the hatch, unmoving.  “Tell me or you’re not coming in.”

Wyatt rolled his eyes.  “You don’t need to know.”

Lucy raised a petulant eyebrow.  “How do you know what I need to know?”

“I tell you and you’re gonna be upset,” Wyatt said.

Lucy shrugged.  “Then I’ll be upset.”

Wyatt blew out a breath.  “Some old guy ripped it off me when I was pretending to be a prostitute and he was trying to get me naked.”

He wasn’t sure who looked more taken aback, Lucy or Rufus.

“Can I come in now?”

Lucy moved out of his way wordlessly, and Rufus held his hand out to help him up.

Although Wyatt being Wyatt insisted on helping Lucy up first.

Once settled in his chair in the Lifeboat, Wyatt took a long breath as Rufus shut the hatch, closing his eyes and leaning his head back against his seat.

He could feel Lucy inspecting him without even being able to see her.

“Can we debrief after coffee?” he asked without opening his eyes.  “And breakfast?  And maybe in 54 years’ time?”

“What do you mean, you were ‘pretending to be a prostitute?’” Lucy demanded at length. 

Wyatt opened his eyes and raised his head to look at her.  “Debrief later?” he asked again plaintively.

Lucy raised both eyebrows expectantly, while Rufus studiously did not turn around to the control panel to start firing up the Lifeboat.

Wyatt sighed.  “It’s a long story.”

“You’ve got 54 years to tell it,” Lucy informed him.

“Okay, you win,” Wyatt conceded with a sigh.  “Flynn was after a guy, okay?”

“And?”

Wyatt was tired, but not tired enough to have not spent the last hour considering what he was going to tell Lucy. 

And what he _wasn’t_ going to tell her.

“This guy had tried to kill some Rittenhouse bigwig.  Flynn wanted to help him escape so he could finish the job.”

“Which Rittenhouse bigwig?” Rufus asked, and Wyatt shrugged dismissively.

“Don’t remember his name.”

“Yeah, like _that’s_ gonna happen!” Rufus scoffed.  Squinted at Wyatt.  Then added, “Is it?”

Wyatt shrugged and closed his eyes again.  “It’s been a hard day.”

“Hey!” Lucy nudged him with her foot.  “I happen to _know_ you’re not really sleeping.”

Wyatt opened his eyes again.  “C’mon, give a guy a break,” he said, before adding, “Ma’am,” with a smirk.

Lucy shook her head and folded her arms across her chest.  “Not getting around me that way, Sergeant,” she informed him.

Rufus inclined his head to one side.  “You might want to elaborate on that whole ‘pretending to be a prostitute’ thing, too,” he suggested.

“I really don’t,” Wyatt countered.

“Wyatt?”  And darn it if Lucy didn’t sound exactly like that female sergeant who got him out of trouble in Afghanistan.

Wyatt sighed and sat up a little straighter.  “Okay,” he said.  “You asked for it.  One of the guards was running this prostitution gig on the side.  Somehow, he was getting rich guys into the prison to...enjoy the company of some of the inmates.  This guy Flynn was interested in had gotten himself killed first time around trying to use the intel from one of the clients to escape.  Flynn figured maybe I was this particular client’s type and would have better luck getting the intel and getting the three of us out in one piece.”

“So...you were working with _Flynn_?” Lucy asked a little incredulously.

“Honestly didn’t have a lot of choice,” Wyatt said.  “It was him or a rape gang.”

“Dude, I _told_ you you were gonna be the freakin’ Homecoming Queen!” Rufus burst out.

Lucy squinted at him. 

It was Rufus’ turn to shrug, gesturing at Wyatt as he did so.  “Look at him,” he invited her.  “Pretty boys and jail.  He’s a total cliché!”

Wyatt frowned.  “That’s pretty much what Flynn said,” he observed.

“And so you turned to _prostitution_?” Lucy put in disbelievingly.

“I was playing a role,” Wyatt said, echoing what he’d told her after that unrehearsed kiss at Bonnie and Clyde’s place.

And the reference apparently wasn’t lost on Lucy.

“Look, I never actually—” Wyatt began to protest.  “I mean, I didn’t let anyone... Y’know, it was all kinda confusing, I had this cellmate the size of the Hoover Dam who wouldn’t stop looking at me, and there were all these guys coming on to me, and this guard who seemed convinced I was disrespecting him because I called him ‘sir,’ and turns out _he_ had the hots for me too, and, y’know, there was this whole thing where because no one had claimed me, they could all pretty much do whatever they wanted to me, and I really didn’t have a clue what was going on and then Flynn was kissing me and then the thing with the guard and the client and the whole chocolate sauce thing, which was _really_ freakin’ creepy as all hell, and then—”

“Wait, what?  Back up,” Rufus interjected.  “Flynn was _what_?”

Wyatt stopped and blinked.  Had he just said that out loud?  _Crap_.

“ _What_ did Flynn do?” Lucy repeated.  “Wyatt?”

Wyatt stopped.  Took a breath.  Leaned his head back against his chair and closed his eyes.  “Can we _please_ talk about this later?” he begged.

Lucy grabbed his wrist, and when Wyatt opened his eyes again, she was holding it up to the meager light, inspecting the lovely pattern of purple bruising that had come out in the last hour.  “How did this happen?” she demanded, momentarily distracted from the pretty big freakin’ bombshell Wyatt just dropped.

“The guard,” he said.  “Liked to—uh—watch?  Didn’t like it when I put up a fight.  Although, to be fair, the old guy who’d paid for me for the evening didn’t need much help.  He was strong as hell for a guy his age.”

“And was this before or after Flynn _kissed_ _you_?” Rufus demanded.

Okay, Wyatt figured.  There were two ways he could play this.  The truth—absolute goddamn horror that he almost got himself raped and Lucy erased from history—or the tried and tested “lets hide our real feelings behind sarcastic humor” method, beloved by the military and men in general for hundreds of years.

“He was a lousy date,” Wyatt said, predictably going with option two.  “Never even offered to buy me dinner first.”

_“Wyatt.”_

Wyatt sighed.  “He was trying to protect me, believe it or not.  By claiming me?  Got the other inmates off my back.  Kinda literally.”

“And he lured you there?” Lucy clarified.  “To seduce this particular client into showing you, Flynn and this prisoner he was interested in the way he got into and out of the prison?”

Wyatt nodded.  “So we could get out.”

“And what happened?  In the end?”

Wyatt shrugged.  “We got out.”

“And this prisoner?”

“I kind of shot him.”

“Dead?”

“It’s my job to preserve history, right?

“So this was all kind of for nothing?” Lucy observed.  “If the prisoner Flynn wanted to escape actually died anyway?”

Wyatt gazed at her evenly.  “Not for nothing,” he said carefully.  “I kept history kind of intact at least.  Stopped Flynn getting what he wanted.”

_Saved you from being erased._

He leaned his head back again.

 _I’ll tell Agent Christopher,_ he told himself.  _I’ll tell her everything.  Lucy doesn’t need to know._

When Lucy didn’t respond, Wyatt did the only thing he could.  Distraction.  That had been his intended role in all this all along, right?

Leaning forward, he helped her buckle herself into her seat.  Because that’s what he always did.

“Can we go home now?” he asked, sounding a little bit intentionally pathetic.

Lucy was still obviously inspecting him, but she nodded slightly at Rufus.

“I know there’s something you’re not telling me,” she said quietly, as Rufus began powering up the Lifeboat, and Wyatt didn’t look away from her questioning gaze.

He took a breath.  “I’ll tell you,” he said.  “Eventually.  I promise.”

And he was pretty sure he meant it.

*

The debrief with Agent Christopher was a long one.

Wyatt had a lot to tell her, a lot he’d not been able to share with Lucy and Rufus.

What surprised him the most?  She wasn’t surprised.  Turns out she’d been doing some surveillance of her own on Benjamin Cahill.  She already knew he was Rittenhouse.  She just hadn’t quite figured out why he seemed so fascinated by the goings on at Mason Industries, besides his obvious interest in the time machine.

She would tell Lucy when the time was right, she said.

Wyatt had spent a few minutes doing some research of his own afterwards.  Not on the Cahills.  He knew they had to have survived or Lucy wouldn’t be here.

But on Isaiah Dixon.

What Flynn had said about Fate or Time or the Universe or God never allowing him to save his wife and daughter, therefore Wyatt would never be able to save Jessica, had really gotten under his skin.  A lot more than he cared to admit.

Robert Reed’s life had been spared by Flynn and his time machine, but he had still died trying to escape prison. 

William Mackie had woken up in his car to find it surrounded by cops investigating a dead escaped prisoner only a few feet away.  He had told them he’d been parked in his car having a cigarette when he’d seen three men in prison uniforms run out of the storm drain.  They’d argued, and one of them had been shot.  The two remaining men, one with an unusual accent and the other with striking blue eyes, had tried to break into his car.  He’d fought them off, but they’d pistol whipped him with a gun, he even had the bruise to his temple—where Wyatt had hit him with O’Donovan’s nightstick—to prove it.

Mackie may have been unconscious at the time, but his version of events was close enough to what actually happened for the cops to believe him.

Thirty years later, just before he died, he’d told the same journalist what had actually happened and the report Flynn had read that sent him hurtling off to 1963 had been published.

Patrick O’Donovan had still gotten away with most of it, despite his middle class brothel room being uncovered, and he’d still died ten years later when he propositioned the wrong inmate.

Nothing had changed.

Except for Isaiah Dixon.  The man whose place at Greenside Penitentiary had been assumed by Flynn and whose place as William Mackie’s “date” had been assumed by Wyatt.

The man saved from death by the very man who claimed such a thing might not be possible.

Wyatt gripped his phone tightly, typed Isaiah Dixon’s name into Google and held his breath.

 _Dammit_.

Isaiah Dixon, the Internet told him, had died on the 14th May 1963 after being stabbed during a barfight.

So Flynn might have given him an extra couple of weeks of life, but even Isaiah Dixon had died pretty much as Time, Fate, The Universe, had intended.

It was a sobering, terrifying thought.

But he still had to try.

No matter how he might feel about anything—any _one_ —else.

He still had to try and save Jessica.

“Penny for ’em.”

Wyatt startled as Lucy was suddenly sitting next to him on the bench in the locker room.

“Jeez!” he burst out.  “You nearly gave me a heart attack!”

Lucy grinned lopsidedly at him.  “Guess you shouldn’t sneak up on a guy just out of stir,” she said.

Wyatt shook his head.  “Not even 24 hours _in_ stir,” he told her.  “Doesn’t exactly make me a lifer.”

Lucy’s grin sobered a little, and suddenly her hand was on top of his on the bench between them.

“Seriously,” she said.  “You’ve had kind of a hectic day.  You sure you’re okay?”

Wyatt shrugged.  “Just another day at the office,” he said, before adding, “The crazy office where we time travel for a living.”

“It’s okay to be scared once in a while,” Lucy pointed out.

Wyatt unconsciously scratched at his neck where Flynn had marked him.  “I wasn’t scared,” he said.  “At least, I wasn’t scared of Flynn or his prison bullshit.”

“Then what _were_ you scared of?  Because I know you, Wyatt, and something spooked you.”

He shrugged awkwardly.  “Some of the things Flynn said,” he murmured.  “About Fate and Time not allowing us to change anything that really matters to us....  It—I—”

“You’re scared of not being able to get Jessica back?” Lucy guessed.

Wyatt nodded, but wasn’t sure that’s what he meant.

_I’m scared of losing you._

“It makes me wonder if it’s all kind of futile.”  He gestured around them with a shrug.  “All of this.  Are we just making things worse?” 

_Like Flynn._

“We’re trying to _stop_ people like Flynn and Rittenhouse from altering time,” Lucy said.  “I don’t know about Jessica, or Flynn’s family, I don’t know whether they were meant to die. I do know Amy isn’t supposed to be _gone.  You’re_ the one who taught _me_ we need to choose what we’re fighting for.  You stopped Flynn from murdering a man and his family, and potentially erasing all of his descendants.”  Wyatt glanced at her but had to look away again in case he gave anything away.  “Were they all meant to die?  I don’t know that either.  But if someone is going to use time travel to change reality to suit their own ends, then there needs to be people like us to stop them.  Right?”

Wyatt smiled weakly at her.  “Right,” he agreed slowly.  “And I guess I’ve done worse things than kiss my arch nemesis and pretend to be a prostitute.”

Lucy grinned slyly at him.  “Exactly.  And I’m sure you made a very convincing prostitute.”

Wyatt raised an eyebrow at her.  “That was meant as a compliment, right?”

“Absolutely,” Lucy agreed.  “Now if we can just convince Agent Christopher not to send you on any more solo missions, because much as I’m glad Flynn had your back, I’d much sooner me and Rufus were there to defend your honor.”

“I thought _I_ was supposed to be protecting _you and Rufus_ , not the other way around?” Wyatt observed.

“That’s what they _want_ you to think,” Lucy told him.  “When you’re not looking, me and Rufus totally have your back.”

Wyatt smiled softly at her.  “Yeah, I figured something like that might be going on,” he said, for a second entwining his fingers in hers.  “Wouldn’t have it any other way.”

“Me either,” Lucy agreed.  “Now how about you let me buy you a drink, dollface?”

Wyatt sniggered.  “As long as it’s not bourbon.  Not gonna be able to look at that stuff the same way for a long, long time...”

 

**The End**

 


	2. Tag Scene

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tag scene by request. Wyatt finally tells Lucy what really happened in that prison in 1963...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: So a couple of lovely reviewers on AO3 and FFNet suggested they'd like to read a tag scene or sequel to In The Foxhole where Wyatt finally tells Lucy what Flynn was really up to in Greenside Penitentiary in 1963.
> 
> This is it.
> 
> Hope this doesn't spoil the original story, as it kind of has a very different tone and dynamic (and was written very quickly!)

** IN THE FOXHOLE – TAG SCENE **

 

**February 20 th, 1954**

“Lucy, I need to tell you something.”

It had just stopped snowing outside.

The car Wyatt had boosted was cold and the windows were fogging up a little and he was kinda concerned how long they were going to be sitting in this parking lot in case the car’s owner unexpectedly showed up.  But there was still no sign of Ethan Cahill coming back to his car and Lucy was convinced following him was the best way to find the location of the big Rittenhouse summit.

He could see her breath coming out in little puffs in front of her lips and had to resist the impulse to put his arm around her.  Shared body heat and everything.  No other reason.

She glanced sideways at him.  “I’m not entirely sure we’ve got time for a heart to heart right now, Wyatt,” she said, a little dismissively.

 _My_ _point_ _exactly_ …

They were short on time.  Which was kind of hilarious.  But it also made this easier.

“You know when I went undercover at that prison in Alabama?” he said slowly.

There was a guy walking across the parking lot in the direction of the spot reserved for Mr. Ethan Cahill, and Lucy only spared Wyatt the briefest of glances, her eyes fixed on the guy who may or may not be her grandfather.

“When you were pretending to be a prostitute?” she said shortly.

Wyatt sighed.  “Yes,” he said.  “When I was pretending to be a prostitute.  And thank you so much for reminding me.”

The guy walking across the parking lot carried right on walking straight past the car parked in Ethan Cahill’s spot, and Lucy huffed in annoyance.  “Dammit.”

“So...  When I was in that prison…” Wyatt tried again.  “You said you thought there was something I wasn’t telling you and I promised I’d tell you what it was eventually?”

Lucy’s attention snapped to a young couple suddenly only a few feet away from the car to her right.  She grabbed Wyatt’s arm for a second and he wasn’t sure whether she was urging him to get down or to...do something else that might provide a guy and a girl a reason to be hanging out in a parked car together.

He didn’t move, and the couple continued past and Lucy blew out a breath.  “Thought we were going to have to start necking for a second there,” she said absently, as if reading his mind, before blinking as if she suddenly realized she’d spoken aloud.  And then she was looking at him properly for the first time since they got in the car.  “Huh?” she said, sounding utterly confused.

He held her gaze steadily.  “Prison,” he said.  “Something I promised to tell you?”

She blinked at him again.

Wyatt swallowed and took a breath.  “When you said I didn’t really achieve anything?” he began slowly.  “Other than…”

“Nearly getting raped,” Lucy finished for him.

Wyatt rolled his eyes.  “Besides _that_ ,” he said, trying to maintain his calm or he wasn’t going to be able to do this.  “Because I wound up killing the prisoner Flynn was trying to help escape?”

Lucy nodded slightly, but her attention had wandered back to her grandfather’s parking spot.

Wyatt took another breath.  “His name was Robert Reed,” he told her.  “The guy I killed?”

Lucy ducked slightly as another guy passed them.

“He was in jail for trying to—trying to kill your grandfather,” Wyatt finished at last.  “Ethan Cahill.”

And suddenly he had all of Lucy’s attention.  “What?”

“I didn’t know he was your grandfather,” Wyatt added.  “Flynn just said he was a big name in Rittenhouse.”

Lucy inclined her head slightly, her expression completely unreadable.

“He said he wanted to help Reed escape so he could—so he could finish the job.”

It was Lucy’s turn to take a breath.  “Flynn wanted to kill my grandfather?”

Wyatt shook his head slightly.  “Not so much him,” he said slowly.  “Reed wanted to kill his whole family.  Including your—including your father.  It was your father Flynn was after.  He said he was the one responsible for ordering the murder of his family; threatening Rufus’ family.  He said if he died, it would save you a lot of heartache…”  He trailed off.  “He told me if I helped him, I’d be helping _you_.”

Lucy blinked owlishly at him.  “But my father would have been—he would have been a child then.”

Wyatt nodded.  “One of the reasons I couldn’t let Flynn do it.  Because I knew what _you’d_ say.”

Lucy averted her gaze and was suddenly looking at her gloved hands.

“And then I found out he was your father.”

Lucy’s attention snapped back up to him.  “Flynn _knew_?  And he _told_ you?” she burst out.  “And you didn’t tell _me_?”

Wyatt licked his lips, his mouth suddenly very dry.  “I knew you knew your dad’s name by then,” he tried to explain.  “But you hadn’t told me what it was, so…so it was only when I started to piece together some of the things Flynn let slip—”

“What _things_?” Lucy demanded, and Wyatt couldn’t tell whether she was angry or just disappointed in him for not sharing this with her sooner.

But before he could answer, she suddenly stopped herself.  Blinked.  Bit her lip.  And then she was looking at him again and her whole expression had altered completely.

“You stopped him erasing me from history,” she said.  And it was as if the penny just dropped.

He didn’t answer immediately, couldn’t seem to find the words.

“When we talked about it after,” Lucy continued, “when I was trying to make you feel better and I said you’d saved the Rittenhouse man’s descendants…  You never said.  You never said you’d saved _me_.”

And then her hand was on his cheek and he didn’t know where to look or what to say.

“Wyatt?”

“I couldn’t be the one to tell you,” he said quietly.  “That your father was Rittenhouse.  I just…couldn’t.  I told Agent Christopher everything, but she already knew.  She just didn’t know Benjamin Cahill was your father.  She—she said she’d tell you when the time was right.”

Lucy nodded.  “She did,” she confirmed.  “She told me.  While you were…while you were off trying to save Jessica…” and her hand fell away from his cheek as her words fell away from her mouth.

She turned to face forward again, away from him, hands knotted in her lap.

God, he’d been such an idiot.

“Why did Flynn want to erase me?” Lucy asked quietly, still not looking at him.  “I thought he believed we’d end up working together?”

Wyatt sucked in another breath.  “Because of something you did,” he said carefully.  “Something you’ll do.”

And she was looking at him again.

“I think _you_ gave him your journal, Lucy,” Wyatt said.  “I think you’re the one that started all this.”

Lucy frowned at him.  “How could I give him the journal?” she asked.  “My mother just gave it to _me_.  I haven’t even started to write in it yet…” And she trailed off, as if the implications of what she just said had suddenly started to sink in.

“I know they tell us we can’t travel to any point in time where we already exist,” Wyatt said.  “But I think you did.  Somehow.  Future you.  Flynn said you gave him the journal.  That you were an elderly lady when he first met you.”

Lucy didn’t immediately respond to that.

“He said he had to erase you because he realized he can’t change anything,” Wyatt continued.  “Anything that matters, anyway.”

“Like saving his wife and daughter?”

Wyatt nodded.  “Lucy, he told me _weeks_ before I stole the Lifeboat that I wouldn’t be able to save Jessica.  Even if I killed her killer.  Even if…” he averted his eyes.  “Even if I killed her parents.”

“That’s what was freaking you out,” Lucy said.  “When you came back.  He’d told you you couldn’t save Jessica.  That’s what you were scared of.”

Wyatt shook his head a little.  “Yes,” he said slowly, “and no.”

Lucy glanced up at him. 

“I was scared of losing _you_ , Lucy,” he finally admitted.  “I was scared he might try again.  Or someone else might try again.  He wanted to undo it all, everything he’d done, because he realized the futility of it.  That he couldn’t change any of it, not the things he really wanted to change.  And the only way he could do that was to make sure you never gave him your journal, never told him about time travel.  Never set him on this path.”

Lucy swallowed.

“I made him promise,” Wyatt continued.  “Not to try and erase you again.  I made him promise and I believed him.”

Lucy turned away from him, eyes back on the parking lot, back on her grandfather’s car.

Anywhere but on Wyatt.

“This is all my fault,” she said quietly.

“No,” Wyatt said firmly, catching hold of her chin and angling her face toward him.  “ _No._ None of this is your fault, Lucy.  You can’t take the blame for something you did—something you _might_ do—in the future.  We don’t know what happens between then and now.  We don’t know the full story.  Maybe we _shouldn’t_ know the full story.  Flynn is the one who took the journal, who stole the Mothership, who travelled through time and killed people and erased people and tried to change things he could and couldn’t change.  None of that is on you.  He made his own decisions.  You’re blameless in this.  You can’t help who your father is.  None of us get to choose our family.”

Lucy caught hold of his hand.  “Maybe we do,” she said softly.  “Maybe we _should._ ”

Jessica had been the only family Wyatt had left.  Until he met Lucy and Rufus.

He nodded.  “Maybe we should,” he agreed, squeezing her fingers.

There was a noise outside, footsteps crunching on snow and a car door opening.

“That’s him,” Lucy said, abruptly letting go of Wyatt’s hand as a man climbed into the car parked in Ethan Cahill’s spot, and Wyatt turned his attention to yanking wires out of the dashboard and trying to hotwire the car.

Lucy briefly glanced sideways at him, a wistful look on her face, before she suddenly said, “Rufus is a lot faster at that, by the way.”

He frowned at her as the wires sparked and the engine roared into life.

And then she smiled.

It wasn’t much, barely there, but Wyatt saw it.  Wyatt saw it and in that instant he knew.

_Maybe we do get to choose our family after all._

**The End (again)**

 


End file.
